Toe-challenged Woodpeckers

[Bob Duchesne]

FINALLY, I had a day to sneak off into the north Maine woods in search of Black-backed and Three-toed Woodpeckers. I wasn’t just scouting for tours I’m leading in June; I actually love these guys to pieces.

 

Roads were good west of Baxter State Park, but there is still plenty of snow along the edges. Snow (melting drifts, actually) blocked some of my favorite spruce grouse places and I dipped on them. Got everybody else (i.e. Gray Jay, Boreal Chickadee, and the woodpeckers.)

 

On the Harvester Road, off the Telos Road, there were at least two and maybe three pairs of Black-backed Woodpeckers along the skidder trails. One pair may have followed me some distance down the trail – can’t be sure. They are certainly easier to find this time of year, since the pairs are talking to each other continuously. I couldn’t turn up a three-toed in their usual spot, but one of the male black-backs was enlarging the hole that was used by the three-toed pair last year. Lots of Wilson’s Snipe cavorting in the air. Palm Warblers, Hermit Thrushes, and Winter Wrens were singing in that spot, and juncos were everywhere. Finches were absent. I had one purple and one siskin – no crossbills. One singing Fox Sparrow.

 

Fortunately, I turned up a pair of American Three-toed Woodpeckers in my emergency back-up spot west of Chamberlain Lake. So my final woodpecker total for the day was: Six Black-backed, two American Three-toed, three YB Sapsuckers, three Northern Flickers, two Pileated Woodpeckers, one Hairy, one Downy. Pretty weird when your most common woodpecker is a black-backed, huh?

 

Add a couple of Ruffed Grouse in the road, two more drumming in the woods, and small wandering groups of Rusty Blackbirds, and it was a good day in them thar woods.

 

Bob Duchesne

Woodpecker Whisperer