What do y'all make of this woodpecker?

[Ted Floyd]

Hey, folks. Check out this woodpecker, which I photographed yesterday, Mon., Jan. 22, at the Lake Park Open Space, Boulder County:

If this photo were from, oh I dunno, Yuma, Arizona, or somewhere, wouldn't we call this a male Gilded Flicker? It's got the all-brown crown, the extensive black tail tips, the big black oval on the breast, the pale back, and of course the telltale red malar and bright yellow in the wing and tail. I well realize that we're not in Yuma. But, other than the probabilistic argument, can anybody talk me away from the ledge of calling this a Gilded Flicker?

Sorry, I have no other photos. When I was in the field, I assumed I was looking at a Red-shafted x Yellow-shafted. I will say that two impressions struck me at the time: (1) the truly yellow hues to the wings and tail; (2) a sweetness and wimpiness about the whirrr flushing call.

Also of interest at the Lake Park Open Space was a flock of 10 Steller's Jays. This is the same place that for several years was the easternmost outpost in Boulder County for Woodhouse's Scrub-Jay.

Ted Floyd

Lafayette, Boulder County

[Peter Ruprecht]

That is a neat looking bird!  We had one that looked very similar at our house in Superior several years ago, including the fully brown crown.  Aside from the lack of saguaros in our neighborhood, I convinced myself that it was not a Gilded due to the round spots on the "thighs", which in theory would be more oval on a Gilded.  The bird in your pic looks like it has round spots.  Ours didn't obviously have narrow bars on the back and shoulders.  Unfortunately I never saw ours side-by-side with a Northern for size comparison. 

Wasn't there also a Gilded-looking flicker in Ft. Collins for a few years?  Maybe they do disperse up this way sometimes.  Or maybe Gilded-Northern hybrids provide a means of gene dispersal.

Peter Ruprecht

Superior

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[Todd Deininger]

I have one like this currently at my house in Longmont this year and I have a pic from Jan 2015 of a similar bird. They are too flighty to get a good photo. Below is a Gilded Flicker form Phoenix.

Also, I have have scrub jays on a few occasion at Coyote Run OS in Louisville.

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Todd Deininger
Longmont, CO

[Ted Floyd]

Hey, everybody. Turns out I've been using the name "Lake Park Open Space" a bit too loosely. The flicker was closer to, or perhaps actually within, the Coyote Run Open Space, Louisville, Boulder County. I append a map below. The flicker was making the rounds within the area indicated by the red ellipse. Here ya go:

Sorry for the mixup! And thanks to those of you who nudged me in the right direction.

[Peter Gent]

All,

There is a nice article on intergrade red shafted/yellow shafted Flickers by Steve Mlodinow at
http://birdhybrids.blogspot.com/2014/06/norther-flicker-intergrades.html

Several of the birds (1383, 1384, 1449, 1450) look quite like the bird seen in Boulder County.

Looking through the field guides, perhaps the biggest difference between an intergrade and

Gilded Flicker is in size: Northern Flicker 12.5 inches: Gilded Flicker 11.5 inches in National
Geographic and 11 inches in Sibley.  Very difficult to tell the bird's size from the photograph.

Cheers,  Peter Gent.

Boulder.
 

On Tue, Jan 23, 2018 at 1:53 PM, Ted Floyd <tedfl...@hotmail.com> wrote:

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