Campephilus Woodpeckers

Crimson-bellied Woodpecker Double-Knocks

2012-01-12T01:51:00.003-05:00

The Crimson-bellied Woodpecker is rarely captured on video, so it is exciting to find this high quality video of a male bird. Observe it doing a series of double-knocks, typically used by members of the Campephilus genus as communication signals, and you will notice the bird raising its crest after some of the knocks. This video by Andres Vasquez was captured in Mashpi Rainforest Biodiversity Reserve, La Delicia, Pichincha Province, Ecuador, located two and a half hours drive northwest of Quito.

Robust Woodpecker Feeding Its Young

2011-12-28T14:48:00.002-05:00

This video of a female Robust Woodpecker, Pica-pau-rei, feeding its nestling is remarkable for its quality. You can adjust settings at your end to watch the video in 720p HD. It's interesting to see how it takes a while for the adult bird to transfer the beetle grub to the young bird. This is one of many excellent videos and photos that can be found at Fotografias da Natureza, a site by Jorge Kutsmi where he shares beautiful imagery that he has captured in the Atlantic Forest in Brazil.

Below is an introduction from Jorge Kutsmi's site (translated into English using Google) along with a link to his site.

Visit Fotografias da Natureza here.

Birds of the Atlantic Forest

Most people do not have the opportunity to be in touch with nature and see that there are still gems to survive despite the ravages and neglect by which, directly or indirectly we are all responsible. This reality, the idea of recording a short drive by the Atlantic Forest, to observe their birds, captured by the lens of a camera. Admire them here while they live there in the forest free, perpetual colors, sounds and movements: the nobility of photography!

And here is the intriguing story of this video:

Martjan Lammertink said...
A remarkable thing about this video is that the cavity seems extremely shallow and that the chick seems to be sitting horizontally on the bottom while it is being fed. Typically, Campephilus nest holes (and those of most other woodpeckers) are quite deep. When the chicks are near fledging, they receive food in the nest entrance but in a different posture than what is seen in the video. I e-mailed the film maker Jorge Kutsmi to ask if there was a special circumstance that made the chick end up in this odd, apparent emergency situation of a cavity, and indeed Jorge wrote back to me with the following:

“The explanation I got was that the nest was originally in the same tree (an embaúba tree in an advanced stage of decay). A rain storm with strong gusts of wind broke the tree exactly where the original nest cavity was. The person who took care of the land found the broken tree and two young woodpeckers, one dead and another alive and all wet. Because the parents were around he put the chick in another cavity in the part of the same tree that was still standing and they started to feed him. It is even possible the hole in the video was made by the person who rescued the chick, I never met him and did not hear more details of the event”.

Happy Holidays!

2011-12-25T21:18:00.004-05:00

This Christmas day seems like a good time to wish everyone a happy, healthy new year! Although I haven't posted much lately, terrific photo and video footage of Campephilus woodpeckers continues to emerge on a frequent basis. Bear with me as I get caught up and continue sharing with you some of the best materials I find on these remarkable birds.

Forest Birds of the World - Magellanic Woodpecker

2011-12-25T21:15:00.002-05:00

Congratulations to researcher Martjan Lammertink who won first prize in November 2011 for the category Forest Birds of the World with this photo of a juvenile male Magellanic Woodpecker that he took in Nahuel Huapi National Park, Argentina. The photo contest was organized by SEO/BirdLife, the branch of BirdLife International in Spain, to commemorate the International Year of Forests 2011.

The fact that the winning photos were selected from a total of 1,050 images submitted by 305 professionals from 13 countries is a testament to how attractive and charismatic Magellanic Woodpeckers are as forest ambassadors.

Find more details and the two other first prize winning photos here:

Enlace a un artículo Natural (en Español)

Link to article in Natural (in English)

New Study Analyzes Only Known Footage of Vanished Imperial Woodpecker

2011-10-26T11:00:00.008-04:00

There is big news today as the only film ever found of an Imperial Woodpecker is released in the form of 85 seconds of stunning color movie footage! The film provides us with a unique look back through time at a species that is presumed to be extinct.

Imperial Woodpecker, female

Image by William L. Rhein, courtesy of Cornell Lab of Ornithology

At two-feet tall, the magnificent Imperial Woodpecker of Mexico was the largest woodpecker in the world. It probably became extinct in the late 20th century. To date, there has been no known photo or film documentation available of this species in life. But that changes today with the publication of a new paper in the October, 2011 issue of The Auk, the journal of the American Ornithologists' Union.

The paper, by lead author Martjan Lammertink along with four Cornell Lab of Ornithology staff members and two Mexican biologists, is entitled Film Documentation of the Probably Extinct Imperial Woodpecker (Campephilus Imperialis). It details the remarkable 16-mm color film of an Imperial Woodpecker shot in 1956 by William L. Rhein, a dentist and amateur ornithologist. Rhein shot the film with a hand-held camera from the back of a mule while camping in a remote location in the Sierra Madre Occidental in Durango state, Mexico.

Here is a link where you can view the 85-second color film, download the Auk article, hear Rhein narrate scenes from his 1956 expedition, read about the March 2010 follow up expedition to the film site, and see the painted Imperial Woodpecker cover art that serves as the cover of the current edition of The Auk:

www.birds.cornell.edu/imperialfilm

Although Rhein has been widely attributed with the last sighting record of an Imperial Woodpecker, the existence of his film was not known until recently. In the mid-1990s, biologist M. Lammertink discovered a mention of the film at Cornell in letters that Rhein and a colleague sent to ivorybill researcher James Tanner in 1962. He tracked Rhein down and they viewed the film together in 1997. In 2005 Rhein's nephew, R. Thorpe, donated the film to the Macaulay Library at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology.

Imperial Woodpecker, female

Image by William L. Rhein, courtesy of Cornell Lab of Ornithology

Viewing the amazing film footage, you will see a female Imperial Woodpecker hitching up and foraging on the trunks of large Durango pines in its old-growth forest environment before launching into flight. A March 2010 expedition to the film site gained insights on the bird's probable extinction, but turned up no evidence that Imperial Woodpeckers are still alive. Unfortunately, the bird and its old-growth forest are gone now, making the film footage an especially precious find.

Red-necked Woodpecker Species Account

2011-10-16T21:33:00.011-04:00

pica-pau-de-barriga-vermelha femea, a photo by vhobusfoto on Flickr.

I recently authored a detailed species account on the Red-necked Woodpecker at Neotropical Birds Online (NBO). It begins: The Red-necked Woodpecker is a large, spectacular Campephilus woodpecker of the rainforest. It is fairly common in Colombia and Venezuela and across the Guianas, and south through Amazonia to northern Bolivia. Each species account in NBO includes information on the identification, distribution, life history, conservation, and research references for a particular bird along with image and sound files for that species. Visit NBO to read more about profiled Neotropical bird species and to see how you may contribute to authoring or enhancing additional species accounts!

Red-necked Woodpecker species account at Neotropical Birds Online

The superb photo you see here is a female Red-necked Woodpecker near Matto Grasso, Brazil. It is posted here with permission of talented wildlife photographer Valdir Hobus.

See more of V. Hobus' fine photography here

Powerful Woodpecker - Tapichalaca, Ecuador

2011-09-26T21:59:00.001-04:00

Powerful Woodpecker - Tapichalaca - South-Ecuador, a photo by fveronesi1 on Flickr.

This image of a male Powerful Woodpecker displays its feature very well. It has a black bill, face black with white stripe, and a red crown. Females lack any red, having entire forehead to hindneck black. Endemic to northwestern South America, this species favors an especially beautiful environment - wet montane and cloud forest, often on steep slopes, at elevations of 4,000 to 12,000 feet in the Andes mountains.

Enjoy listening to a couple of the Powerful Woodpecker's calls here:

Reference: Short, L. L. 1982:432-433. Woodpeckers of the World. Delaware Museum of Natural History, Greenville, Delaware.

Photo posted here under Creative Commons license.

Crimson-bellied Woodpecker - Tapichalaca, Ecuador

2011-08-10T00:19:00.007-04:00

Crimson-bellied Woodpecker - Tapichalaca, Ecuador - April 2011, a photo by grallaria on Flickr.

It's always great to find a good photograph of a Crimson-bellied Woodpecker because they are the least often photographed species of the Campephilus genus. They're also known by the name Splendid Woodpecker. The white band down this bird's neck identifies it as a female. The male's neck is all red.

Thanks to Luke Seitz for granting permission to post his photo here! He writes:

My experience with this individual was pretty brief, but it was the first time I'd seen the east slope subspecies of Crimosn-bellied, which is quite a bit brighter than the west slope subspecies and potentially a separate species...definitely a great bird either way!

Ivory-billed Woodpecker Illustration

2011-07-31T23:59:00.002-04:00

From Mark Yuhina, we have this splendid illustration of a male Ivory-billed Woodpecker, posted here with the artist's permission. Mark recently posted it on his blog where you can see more of his work. Here's the link:

Yuhina Illustration

When I inquired about this illustration, Mark mentioned that he "examined some specimens from a museum to get a more accurate morphology. In the future, I am planning to illustrate more birds in this genus." Let's hope he does!

How This Site is Organized

2010-02-27T22:00:00.003-05:00

Everything that appears on this page, from top to bottom, is the Home Page.

New Posts appear above this one

They eventually get backdated to group them with their respective topics

Resource Posts appear below this one

They are here to serve new and returning visitors with readily available info on all the Campephilus species names, major media links, etc.
They tend to remain on the Home Page

Easily Find What You Want

Use Image Icons in the left sidebar to retrieve posts by species
Select the News and Research buttons for posts on those areas of interest.
Or, Select Any Category from the right sidebar to retrieve posts by category

Campephilus Species

2010-02-19T20:43:00.028-05:00

There are either 11 or 12 Campephilus species depending on how the Ivory-billed Woodpecker is classified. For more details, see a separate post at this link.

RANGE MAPS

Click on a species name to see its range map at Avibase, courtesy of NatureServe.

Cream-backed Woodpecker (Campephilus leucopogon)

Crimson-bellied Woodpecker (Campephilus heamatogaster)

Crimson-crested Woodpecker (Campephilus melanoleucos)

Cuban Ivory-billed Woodpecker (Campephilus principalis bairdii)

Guayaquil Woodpecker (Campephilus gayaquilensis)

Imperial Woodpecker (Campephilus imperialis)

Ivory-billed Woodpecker (Campephilus principalis)

Magellanic Woodpecker (Campephilus magellanicus)

Pale-billed Woodpecker (Campephilus guatemalensis)

Powerful Woodpecker (Campephilus pollens)

Red-necked Woodpecker (Campephilus rubricollis)

Robust Woodpecker (Campephilus robustus)

Various other sites offer the range map and other species information for each Campephilus woodpecker. See, for example, this page at Xeno-canto:

Species Overview page for the Crimson-bellied Woodpecker

Campephilus Nomenclature

2010-02-19T20:42:00.006-05:00

For a most incredibly detailed resource on Campephilus woodpecker nomenclature, visit Zoonomen's Zoological Nomenclature Resource at this link. (It will take some searching to find "campephilus" there. Select PICIFORMES in the left frame, and then Campephilus will appear near the bottom of the large frame).

Also, you can view a nice, and even more user-friendly, presentation of Campephilus taxonomic hierarchy and nomenclature drawn from Zoonomen at this site:

Integrated Taxonomic Information System

Campephilus Subspecies

2010-02-19T20:42:00.001-05:00

At Avibase, the Cuban Ivory-billed Woodpecker is listed as a subspecies of the US Ivory-billed Woodpecker along with several other Campephilus subspecies. Follow this logo link, then enter "Campephilus" in the search box to retrieve the list with subspecies:

WolframAlpha on Campephilus Woodpeckers

2010-02-19T01:35:00.008-05:00

Here is an image from the Ivory-billed Woodpecker (Campephilus principalis) search result from Wolfram Alpha's computational knowledge search engine that details Campephilus taxonomy.

Taxonomic network:

http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=ivory-billed+woodpecker
Source: Wolfram Alpha LLC. 2010. Wolfram|Alpha.
(accessed February 20, 2010).

By the way, if you've never entered your birth day, month and year into Wolfram Alpha, you may want to try it out here.

A Fossil Campephilus Species

2010-02-16T01:34:00.001-05:00

In his book In Search of the Ivory-billed Woodpecker, Jerome A. Jackson relates that a fossil species was described as Campephilus dalquesti by Pierce Brodkorb, an American ornithologist and paleontologist. This fossil species was discovered in Scurry County in central Texas, and dated to the late Pliocene epoch.

I wonder what C. dalquesti looked like. Maybe a bit like this dino-bird!? At least the colors look right. The dino-bird portrayed below is Anchiornis huxleyi - you can find more info here.

Check out this amazing video on finding dino color in fossil feathers.

The Internet Bird Collection - Videos, Photos & Sounds

2010-02-16T00:52:00.002-05:00

The Internet Bird Collection (IBC) is a free audiovisual library "with the ultimate goal of disseminating knowledge about the world's avifauna." Many thousands of videos, photos and sounds at the IBC inform birders, ornithologists, conservationists, etc. and showcase a variety of bird behavior. The IBC welcomes people to upload and share their own bird videos, photos and sounds on the site.

http://ibc.lynxeds.com/search/ibc_features/campephilus

As you'd expect, you'll find many Campephilus videos, photos and sounds at the IBC!

Handbook of the Birds of the World by Lynx Edicions

2010-02-16T00:51:00.008-05:00

The Internet Bird Collection is a non-profit endeavor sponsored by the Handbook of the Birds of the World, whose publishers happened to select the Magellanic Woodpecker, the largest woodpecker in South America, to represent the entire Picidae family on the cover of Volume 7.

http://www.lynxeds.com/hbw/handbook-birds-world-v7

Some people were not quite as thrilled with that selection as I was. In an overwhelmingly positive review of the book, Geoffrey Carpentier had this to say about the cover:

With a book of this nature, one has to try very hard before finding fault. My only quibble:

I didn't like the picture of the Magellanic Woodpecker on the cover. It seems

an ungainly bird and a prettier one could have been chosen.

Oh well! You can click here for his full review.

Listen at the Macaulay Library

2010-02-16T00:50:00.005-05:00

The Cornell Lab of Ornithology's Macaulay Library bills itself as "The World's Largest Archive of Animal Sounds and Video." Follow the link below, and you'll be able to search for over 200 Campephilus woodpecker sound files by common or scientific name.

http://macaulaylibrary.org/index.do

The Macaulay Library contains the notable 10 min, 20 sec length recording of Ivory-billed Woodpeckers drumming, making kents and also other vocalizations all recorded by Arthur A. Allen and his team in April, 1935. It also contains a 1 min, 40 sec recording of what may be kent calls of the Ivory-billed Woodpecker recorded by John V. Dennis on February 25, 1968 in Texas.

Listen at Xeno-Canto

2010-02-16T00:28:00.005-05:00

Xeno-canto is a community database of shared bird sounds from around the world. It's an ever-growing collection of bird sounds. At xeno-canto, you can listen to dozens of Campephilus woodpecker vocalizations, drumming and knocks from 9 out of the 12 species. Missing are any sounds of the Ivory-billed Woodpecker, the Cuban Ivory-billed Woodpecker and the Imperial Woodpecker. That still leaves a multitude of recordings of the rest of the Campephilus family for your enjoyment and study.

http://www.xeno-canto.org/browse.php?query=campephilus

Xeno-canto lets visitors to its site participate by discussing and identifying unknown sounds. And, if you record bird sounds, you should know that xeno-canto also lets people upload and share their own recordings on the site.

Also, don't miss the highly informative Species Overview pages on Xeno-Canto. Available from the left frame menu, these pages offer a summary of number of species sound recordings, photos, range maps and sonogram images. See this page, for example:

Species Overview page for the Red-necked Woodpecker

WikiAves - A Enciclopédia das Aves do Brasil

2010-02-16T00:27:00.014-05:00

WikiAves Encyclopedia of Brazilian Birds is an amazing resource of Campephilus descriptive information, photos and sounds. WikiAves represents the four species of Campephilus woodpeckers, listed below, that can be found in Brazil.

The photographs that I have seen in WikiAves are among the most spectacular ones that I've seen anywhere.

In English and Portuguese, the four species of Campephilus in WikiAves are:

Cream-backed Woodpecker Pica-pau-de-barriga-preta

Crimson-crested Woodpecker Pica-pau-de-topete-vermelho

Red-necked Woodpecker Pica-pau-de-barriga-vermelha

Robust Woodpecker Pica-pau-rei

Although the entry on the Cream-backed Woodpecker is rather slim (as of this posting) the others have a wealth of descriptive information. And you'll find sounds and photos for all of them. You can cut and paste the Portuguese text into your favorite web-based translator to understand the entries.

SIB - Parques Nacionales - Sistema de Información sobre Biodiversidad

2010-02-16T00:10:00.016-05:00

There are 4 species of Campephilus that are native to Argentina which contain interesting and detailed profiles (en Español) along with dramatic illustrations of each species, except the Robust Woodpecker, at the SIB - Parques Nacionales - Sistema de Información sobre Biodiversidad site. Be a bit patient to allow this site to load.

In English and with their Spanish names, the four species of Campephilus at the SIB site are:

1. Crimson-crested Woodpecker Carpintero garganta negra

Carpintero grande

2. Cream-backed Woodpecker Carpintero lomo blanco

3. Magellanic Woodpecker Carpintero gigante Carpintero negro patagónico

Carpintero patagónico

4. Robust Woodpecker Carpintero grande

SORA Searchable Ornithological Research Archive

2010-02-15T00:15:00.000-05:00

Originally posted 4/10/10 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

This posts highlights the extraordinary SORA project, the source of an incredible array of ornithological journal articles. The SORA project is described as follows at the site:

The SORA project is an open access electronic journal archive and is the product of a collaboration between the American Ornithologists Union, the Cooper Ornithological Society, the Association of Field Ornithologists, the Wilson Ornithological Society and the University of New Mexico libraries and IT department.

Here is the link to SORA.

Of course, there are many interesting articles on Campephilus woodpeckers within SORA. For example, searching for the word "guayaquil" by keyword quickly retrieves this full-text article from within SORA:

WILLIAMS

First Description of the Nest, Eggs and Nestling of the Guayaquil Woodpecker (Campephilus [Phloeoceastes] Gayaquilensis) (Wilson Bulletin: Vol. 92, No. 4, October-December, 1980)

Here is an excerpt from that article:

The nest cavity was in the main trunk about 6 m above the ground. Its irregularly shaped entrance was large enough (about 75 x 100 mm) to admit my hand, and it was about 30 cm deep. I could not reach the cavity’s bottom or its contents, but using a mirror, I saw 1 egg and 1 newly-hatched young. The shell of the hatched egg was still in the nest. The eggs were white and immaculate-typical large woodpecker eggs. The nestling was making weak chirping sounds. Its eyes were closed, and it appeared naked; however, in the dim light of the cavity, sparse down probably would not have been obvious. It had a conspicuous eggtooth. I visited this nest again at 13:50. After approaching within 6-8 m of the female at the cavity entrance, I made several color transparencies (Frontispiece). I never saw more than 1 adult at this site.

I am amazed at how little still is known of the breeding and behavior of the Campephilus woodpeckers.

Cream-backed Woodpecker

2010-02-10T23:58:00.000-05:00

Originally posted 3/20/2010 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

Some of the best woodpecker photos (Campephilus and others) that you will ever find are at a site called PicidPics, like this fantastic photo of a male Cream-backed Woodpecker.

PicidPics features photos of picids, including woodpeckers, piculets and wrynecks by Martjan Lammertink and Julio Pérez Cañestro. The site also features photos of woodpecker researchers in the field and photos of secondary cavity users.

Visit PicidPics here

Photo © Martjan Lammertink, posted here with permission.

This photo shows the bird's pale creamy mantle in excellent detail. The male has a bright red head with black and white marks at the lower rear edge of its ear coverts. Like some Campephilus relatives, the Cream-backed Woodpecker has a striking chisel-shaped, ivory-colored bill.

You can also see here the long toe that the large Campephilus woodpeckers extend to their side to secure their stance against a tree. It's a good brace against gravity! You'd probably extend your arms out to either side like this if you found yourself braced against a cliff on a narrow ledge.

The Cream-backed Woodpecker inhabits subtropical and dry tropical forests in south central South America in Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay. Unlike several of its close relatives, this species occurs in savannas, and it can be observed visiting isolated trees in open areas.

Cream-backed Woodpecker - 3 Photos

2010-02-10T23:52:00.000-05:00

Originally posted 3/22/11 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

Silvia Vitale was kind enough to grant permission for me to post these excellent photos she took of a female Cream-backed Woodpecker. She took them at La Cumbre, Cordoba Province, Argentina near the village. As you see here, the female sports a striking, white moustachial stripe adjacent to her ivory bill. The male bird's head is almost entirely red. Cream-backed Woodpeckers inhabit xeric (dry) woodlands of the chaco habitat in southern-central parts of South America, occurring in savannas, pastures with copses, groves, woodland and transitional forests, up to 2,500m.*

You can find many more of Silvia's beautiful bird and nature images here:

The Internet Bird Collection

Foto-Naturaleza

ARKive

Listen to pi-ow! calls and some wing fluttering.

Listen to a few alarm calls and some melodious whirring notes.

Listen to three sets of loud double-knocks!

*Reference - Woodpeckers: A Guide to the Woodpeckers of the World by H. Winkler, DA Christie & D. Nurney.

Cream-backed Woodpecker Video

2010-02-10T23:50:00.002-05:00

Recorded 24 October 2005
Location Loro Hablador Provincial Park, Chaco, Argentina.
Duration 13 seecs

A male Cream-backed Woodpecker climbing on a trunk.

Cream-backed Woodpecker

2010-02-10T23:45:00.001-05:00

Many thanks to Gary Clark for granting permission to post his stunning photograph of a female Cream-backed Woodpecker here. For more information about this photo, or two see other amazing photos by Gary Clark, visit his web albums at this link.

Cream-backed Woodpecker

2010-02-10T23:34:00.003-05:00

Many thanks to Karisusi78 for sharing this video of a male Cream-backed Woodpecker from Paraguay.

Cream-backed Woodpecker

2010-02-10T23:33:00.005-05:00

Many thanks to Karina Diarte on Flickr for sharing this striking photo of a male Cream-backed Woodpecker here. The photo is posted here with her permission.

Cream-backed Woodpecker

2010-02-10T00:40:00.000-05:00

Many thanks to Karina Diarte on Flickr for sharing this beautiful photo of a female Cream-backed Woodpecker here. The photo is posted here with her permission.

Carpintero Lomo Blanco

2010-02-10T00:33:00.002-05:00

Originally posted 10/19/10 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

Here is an interesting video posted by infofon on YouTube that shows a female Carpintero Lomo Blanco, a Cream-backed Woodpecker, displaying an array of behaviors. Two birds are briefly in flight before one bird does a couple of double raps (typical of some members of the Campephilus genus) perhaps to signal another bird nearby. I'm not sure whether or not it is the same bird seen earlier, but toward the end of the video, you will see a female hitching herself up a tree trunk and then foraging.

Press play, then change the setting at the lower right of the video box from 360p to 480p to watch it at higher resolution.

I know a little Spanish, but not enough to translate the comments in this video. If you can translate them into English, please post a comment and then I'll revise this post with that info. UPDATE - Thanks to Martjan for this translation of the video comments into English:

"Well, we are going to try to continue observing. They told us it is very difficult to make a video take because they do not sit still. And they stay very few seconds in a tree and then fly to another tree. So we continue to walk, searching for other individuals around here".

Cream-backed Woodpeckers: A Closer Look

2010-02-10T00:31:00.001-05:00

Originally posted 7/4/10 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

It's hard to convey the brilliance of the nearly 150-year old, hand-colored lithographs in Alfred Malherbe's Monographie des Picidées that one sees upon viewing the genuine article. A closer look at the Cream-backed Woodpeckers depicted in Plate III (female, above and male, below) helps to reveal more of their fine detail. My apologies if the occasional large-sized photos I post are less than ideal for your particular monitor.

The flight feather on the right belongs to the Robust Woodpecker. See the full Plate III illustration for a comparison of Cream-backed and Robust Woodpecker flight feathers.

This illustration is within the public domain appears here courtesy of the Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Columbia University in the City of New York.

Mégapic de Boié, the Cream-backed Woodpecker

2010-02-10T00:30:00.000-05:00

Originally posted 7/3/10 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

Here's Plate III from Alfred Malherbe's Monographie des Picidées depicting the striking female Cream-backed Woodpecker on the left, the male bird on the right, and a pair of Robust Woodpeckers in the background.

Clicking on any of these illustrations will take you into my album of Malherbe's illustrations where you can download large-sized illustration files. The image above is within the public domain and it appears here courtesy of the Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Columbia University in the City of New York.

Cream-backed Woodpeckers: Two Videos

2010-02-10T00:24:00.000-05:00

Originally posted 8/21/2010 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

Enjoy two videos recently posted by baco1970 that show the striking Cream-backed Woodpecker in Brazil.

The first video shows a male bird that has a red crest and red head with a small oval of black and white at the lower rear edge of its ear coverts. The second video shows one male with two female birds whose crests are a bit longer than the male's, with black from the forehead up through the central area of the crest. Females birds also display dramatic looking moustachial stripes.

To view many more amazing bird videos, visit baco1970's YouTube channel

or the Pantanal Bird Club site!

This video and the next one are best viewed in their enhanced versions. Be sure to click 360p in the lower right corner of the frame and select 480p as soon as they start to play.

Cream-backed Woodpecker Family

2010-02-10T00:23:00.001-05:00

Originally posted 9/13/2010 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

Here's a video of a Cream-backed Woodpecker family group that has a pleasant soundtrack and also includes interesting vocalizations by the birds. Near the end, just before the one minute mark, note the two double-knocks that the male bird does which compel a female bird to draw close, from the bottom then toward him by hitching herself up the tree trunk!

Thanks to Michael Blendinger for sharing this clip with us.

Visit his Discovering Bolivia site here.

Cream-backed Woodpecker

2010-02-10T00:22:00.000-05:00

Cream-backed Woodpecker, originally uploaded by Lathers.

Many thanks to Lathers on Flickr for sharing this striking photo of a male Cream-backed Woodpecker here. The photo is posted here with his permission.

Cream-backed Woodpecker - A Pair of Females

2010-02-10T00:20:00.000-05:00

CARPINTERO LOMO BLANCO (Campephilus leucopogon), originally uploaded by arnemiguel.

Many thanks to arnemimiguel on Flickr for granting permission to post this photo of a pair of female Cream-backed Woodpeckers here.

Cream-backed Woodpecker

2010-02-10T00:14:00.000-05:00

Cream-backed Woodpecker, originally uploaded by Charles Hesse.

Many thanks to Charles Hesse for granting permission to post this photo of a male Cream-backed Woodpecker from Llanos de Moxos, Beni.

Cream-backed Woodpecker

2010-02-10T00:12:00.000-05:00

Originally posted 4/10/2010 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

Argen 007, originally uploaded by hanbyholmes.

A male Cream-backed Woodpecker surveys its surroundings in Argentina. Photo is © hanbyholmes and posted here with permission.

Cream-backed Woodpecker

2010-02-10T00:10:00.000-05:00

Originally posted 4/10/2010 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

5 Sep 06 - Cream-Backed Woodpecker - Cloudforests of Salta, Argentina, originally uploaded by hanbyholmes.

A female Cream-backed Woodpecker with her black and red crest along with its namesake plumage visible too. Photo © hanbyholmes and posted here with permission. The photo is noted as taken in the Cloudforests of Salta, Argentina and I am guessing, in the lowland Chaco zone, though I'm not sure. To read more about this area rich in biodiversity, follow this link.

Crimson-bellied Woodpecker, Tapichalaca

2010-02-09T00:20:00.000-05:00

Originally posted 12/5/10 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

Crimson-bellied Woodpecker, Tapichalaca (PM), originally uploaded by pattymcgann.

Seeing this photo of a male Crimson-beliied Woodpecker is exciting because this large, colorful bird is so seldom photographed! Female birds look similar to males, but they have a white band down the side of their neck. It also goes by the name Splendid Woodpecker. It is a forest-dwelling bird that can be found in eastern Panama, Columbia, Ecuador and Peru.

This fine photo was taken in Tapichalaca, Ecuador by Pati Rouzer and it reaches us courtesy of Patty McGann.

You can hear the bird's call here:

And see it's range map along with other sound recordings, including double raps, here at xeno-canto:

Crimson-bellied Woodpecker Range Map & Audio Recordings

Crimson-bellied Woodpecker

2010-02-09T00:15:00.002-05:00

Crimson-bellied Woodpecker © Dubi Shapiro, posted with permission.

This striking image of a Crimson-bellied Woodpecker was taken by Dubi Shapiro At Wildsumaco Lodge in December, 2008. Wildsumaco is a new lodge built in the Andes foothills in eastern Ecuador. This bird is a male. In females, the white band across the cheeks continues down the side of the neck. Rarely photographed, it is described as a very shy woodpecker that prefers to forage at low levels in dense forest. In can be found along mountains of Central and northern South America from Panama through Colombia and western Ecuador to Peru.

View the Range Map

Many thanks to Dubi for letting me share this photo with you. Dubi has an extensive collection of remarkable wildlife photography.

View Dubi Shapiro's photos here at pbase

Reference

- Woodpeckers: A Guide to the Woodpeckers of the World by H. Winkler, D. A. Christie & D. Nurney

Crimson-bellied Woodpecker Illustration

2010-02-09T00:14:00.000-05:00

Originally posted 12/14/10 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

Here is a hand-colored lithograph depicting the very colorful Crimson-bellied Woodpecker in Plate IX by Delahaye from Alfred Malherbe's Monographie des picidées (1859-1862). Figure 1 and 3 represent male birds and figure 2, the bird with the white band on its neck, is a female. Over the past several months, I have been posting the plates from this monumental work which illustrate the eleven species of Campephilus woodpeckers, a task that is now complete with the posting of this ninth plate.

The monograph contains large illustrations of both sexes of the 140 woodpecker species new to science at the time and reduced illustrations of the known species. The birds depicted here in the left background are Orange-backed Woodpeckers. Not within the Campephilus genus, the large Orange-backed Woodpecker (Reinwardtipicus validus) of South-east Asia is the sole member of its genus. Along with the members of the Flameback or Chrysocolaptes genus, perhaps (based upon its appearance) it is one of the species that is more closely related to the Campephilus tribe than the other woodpeckers.

See several photos of the Orange-backed Woodpecker on Flickr

I was able to photograph all 123 hand-colored lithographic plates from the Monographie des picidées. Each plate contains beautiful and interesting illustrations. I hope to make all of the plates available online in the future, though I am not sure when I will get to it. In the meantime, please feel free to contact me if you're ever in need of the corresponding plate for a particular woodpecker species.

This image within the public domain appears here courtesy of the Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Columbia University in the City of New York.

Mégapic à Cou Rouge

2010-02-09T00:12:00.000-05:00

Originally posted 6/6/10 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

Marvelous hand-colored lithographs of each Campephilus woodpecker species appear in Alfred Malherbe's extraordinary Monographie des Picidées, a work that dates back to the early 1860s. These along with many other illustrations depict the then known species of woodpeckers in a total of 123 fine, hand-colored lithographic plates by C.Delahaye, A. Mesnel and P.Oudart under the direction of Malherbe. This one is a detail from Plate IX which is entitled Mégapic à Cou Rouge, the Crimson-bellied Woodpecker.

What is an aficionado to do but spend an afternoon off visiting the rare book room at a local university to examine this epic tome and secure high quality images, as freely permitted at said institution, and then share them with you here at Campephilus Woodpeckers? And so, I present you with just a bit of something to truly look forward to, if you enjoy this sort of fantastic imagery.

You can read more about Alfred Malherbe's magnificent work at this post.

And, see this work's depiction of the largest woodpecker in the world right here.

The additional Campephilus illustrations from Malherbe's work will be coming here soon!

This image within the public domain appears here courtesy of the Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Columbia University in the City of New York.

A Crimson-bellied Woodpecker in the Hand

2010-02-09T00:10:00.000-05:00

Campephilus haematogaster, originally uploaded by MJAndersen.

Many thanks to MJAnderson on Flickr for sharing this extraordinary photo of a
Crimson-bellied Woodpecker here. The photo is posted here with his permission.

As he explained it:

"We were mist-netting birds in the forest as part of a research program at the University of Kansas. This guy was surely a powerful bird to hold in the hand!"

Crimson-bellied Woodpecker

2010-02-09T00:08:00.000-05:00

Image in the public domain, courtesy of Cornell University Library

Digital Collections, Fuertes Illustration Collection at

http://cidc.library.cornell.edu/Fuertes2000/BirdView.asp?From=bbn&QY=w&Size=2&BirdID=1760

Context: Annotation: "Campephilus Peruvian Andes"

Date: 1911c.

Location: Rare and Manuscript Collections

Medium: Pencil;Watercolor

ID Number: 2662-800-0670

Size: 9" x 5.75"

Support: Paper

Type: Studies;Watercolors

Title: Crimson-bellied Woodpecker

Pica-pau-de-topete-vermelho - Fêmea

2010-02-08T23:54:00.002-05:00

Originally posted 12/24/10 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

Pica-pau-de-topete-vermelho (Campephilus melanoleucos melanoleucos) - Fêmea, originally uploaded by Cláudio Timm.

Here's a nicely composed photo of a female Crimson-crested Woodpecker that was taken by Cláudio Timm in the Amazon, Brazil in November 2010. It's got a great background!

I'd like to wish one and all a happy holiday season. May the New Year bring you joy and prosperity!

This photo is posted here under Creative Commons license.

Crimson-crested Woodpecker

2010-02-08T23:53:00.000-05:00

Crimson-crested Woodpecker - Metropolitan Park Panama_MG_2278-291, originally uploaded by fveronesi1.

I love the clarity, colors and composition in this photo! It's a beautiful female Crimson-crested Woodpecker in the Metropolitan National Park, Panama very close to Panama City. The male's head is virtually all red, whereas females - as depicted by the bird in this photo - display a whitish area around the bill that extends into a broad black-bordered white moustache. So the female Crimson-crested Woodpecker has a moustache and the male has no moustache at all. Imagine that!

Check out this photo of the male bird by the same photographer: See it here.

Thanks to fveronensi1 for this Creative Commons licensed photo.

Crimson-crested Woodpecker

2010-02-08T23:52:00.000-05:00

Crimson-crested Woodpecker - Metropolitan Park Panama_MG_2682-361, originally uploaded by fveronesi1.

This photo of a male Crimson-crested Woodpecker was taken in the Metropolitan National Park, Panama - amazingly close to Panama City!

Check out a few key identification marks of the species. The male's head is almost all red and has a small black and white oval patch. Both the male and female show white around the base of the bill. The locale where this photo was taken along with the dark bill indicate that this bird is of the malherbii subspecies (named after Alfred Malherbe) as compared with the species in the southern part of its range.

View the Crimson-crested Woodpecker's Range Map.

Thanks to fveronesi1 for this Creative Commons licensed photo.

Crimson-crested Woodpecker Eats Beetle Larva

2010-02-08T23:51:00.003-05:00

A close-up of a female Crimson-crested Woodpecker extracting a beetle larva from a hole in a trunk.

Pájaro Carpintero vs Serpiente

2010-02-08T01:16:00.000-05:00

Originally posted 10/9/10 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

This dramatic video of a male Crimson-crested Woodpecker defending its nest against a Yellow-bellied Puffing Snake has been around for quite a while. I've resisted posting it here because I cannot trace it to its owners. If anyone has the information on who this video belongs to, I'd be grateful to receive it so I can give due credit.

Here's an interesting comment from snakescientist on YouTube:

For anyone interested, the snake species is Pseustes sulphureus, and are native to the Amazon river basin. They are non venomous, semi arboreal, and feed on rodents, birds, etc. Obviously, they are quite adept at raiding birds' nests and consuming nestling birds and eggs. The woodpecker is defending the nest site against attack.

Many of you have already seen this video. If so, it's worth another viewing. And I'm sure it will be a first-time view here for someone!

Crimson-crested Woodpecker in Ecuador

2010-02-08T01:14:00.001-05:00

Originally posted 11/11/10 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

Ecuador 2010, originally uploaded by L. Kay.

This photo of a male Crimson-crested Woodpecker shows the white feathering at the base of the bird's bill very well along with the black that extends from its neck to upper breast. Thanks to Larry Kay for granting permission to post his photo taken in Ecuador here.

Carpintero Real Pico Amarillo

2010-02-08T01:13:00.001-05:00

Originally posted 8/24/11 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

Carpintero real pico amarillo a photo by barloventomagico on Flickr.

A beautiful female Crimson-crested Woodpecker, Carpintero real pico amarillo, appears here in a fine photo by barloventomagico. This bird's image was captured at La Pomarrosa Farm, Barlovento in north-central Venezuela. You can find an excellent, detailed species account for this woodpecker here:

Sociedad Conservacionista Audubon de Venezuela

Photo posted here under Creative Commons License.

Campephilus melanoleucos. fêmea. Niquelândia.

2010-02-08T01:12:00.001-05:00

Originally posted 4/28/10 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

Campephilus melanoleucos. fêmea. Niquelândia . GO, originally uploaded by Curcino, Alexandre.

Here's a female Crimson-crested Woodpecker with a wonderful expression, looking a little joyful and perhaps even a little crazy! This photo is © Alexandre Curcino. It was taken in Niquelândia, Brazil and is posted here with permission. Niquelândia has one of the largest reserves in the world of what metal? Find out here.

Put Put Putta!

2010-02-08T01:10:00.000-05:00

Originally posted 5/8/10 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

This video is best viewed in the enhanced version. Be sure to click 360p in the lower right corner of the frame above and select 480p as soon as it starts to play.

When they are not keeping silent, Crimson-crested Woodpeckers exhibit a great variety of calls. In this brief video clip, a female Crimson-crested Woodpecker makes a series of vocalizations that sounds a bit like wild laughter! In their book Woodpeckers, Hinkler, et al., remark that in these birds,

Shrill, piping put put puttas, which may be kept up for minutes,

indicates great excitement.

Funny, the title of this video on YouTube is Амазонский малиновохохлый дятел (Pileated Woodpecker).

You can also listen to a similar series of calls here:

Reference
- Woodpeckers: A Guide to the Woodpeckers of the World by H. Winkler, D. A. Christie & D. Nurney

Pica-Pau-de-Topete-Vermelho

2010-02-08T01:09:00.000-05:00

Originally posted 7/1/2011 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

pica-pau-de-topete-vermelho (Campephilus melanoleucos), a photo by Alessandro Abdala on Flickr.

Enjoy one of the finest photos that I have ever seen of a male Pica-Pau-de-Topete-Vermelho, the Crimson-crested Woodpecker. It's difficult to imagine the colors, detail and lighting being any better than what we see here! This photo was taken in Sacramento MG - Brasil by Allesandro Abdala, a designer, photographer and published writer. It is posted here with his permission. To see more of A. Abdala's amazingly beautiful photography, visit his site here:

www.alessandroabdala.com

Crimson-crested Woodpecker

2010-02-08T01:08:00.000-05:00

This video of a female Crimson-crested Woodpecker from YouTube is nice and clear.

Crimson-crested Woodpecker

2010-02-08T01:06:00.000-05:00

IMG_2433_crimson crested woodpecker--female, originally uploaded by joel n rosenthal.
Many thanks to Joel N. Rosenthal for granting permission to post this photo of a female Crimson-crested Woodpecker.

Pica-pau-de-topete-vermelho - Pantanal-MS,BR

2010-02-08T01:05:00.001-05:00

Originally posted 7/17/2011 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

In this brief, interesting video you'll see a male Crimson-crested Woodpecker working on a rotting tree trunk in Brazil.

Crimson-crested Woodpeckers

2010-02-08T01:04:00.000-05:00

This beautiful illustration of a female Crimson-crested Woodpecker (upper left) and one male comes from the four-volume Monographie des picidées (1859-1862), French ornithologist Alfred Malherbe (1804 -1865) (or 1804-1866?). I believe the bird on the lower left is a juvenile female. Describing every known species of woodpecker, the monograph was printed in 100 (or 120?) copies and accompanied by hand-colored lithographs. No surprise, the Wikipedia entry on Alfred Malherbe in French at this link contains more information than the English entry.

A bit more information about this work appears at Zoonomen.net at this link and also see a very detailed mention of it in The Ibis, A Magazine of General Ornithology, Vol. I, 1859
at this link. (You'll want to search for "Malherbe" using your browser if you visit the above two pages).

As for the price of Malherbe's magnificent work, a Google books scan of American Book-Prices Current, Volume 13 lists the 4 volumes with 121 colored plates at a mere $46.

Flash forward to November 11, 1992 and the work sold for $12,482 at Christie's, according to this link here!

Crimson-crested Woodpecker, Preening

2010-02-08T01:00:00.000-05:00

Originally posted 9/26/2010 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

Here's another video that David Ascanio recently posted at the Internet Bird Collection. It's an impressive capture of a female Crimson-crested Woodpecker doing some preening. Notice how she raises her crest 15 seconds into the video. Beautiful! He made this video in El Manteco, Bolívar State, Venezuela.

Mr. Ascanio is with Ascanio Birding Tours. Here are two excerpts from his site:

We have been operating and leading birding tours in Venezuela, Colombia, Trinidad and Tobago, Suriname and Guyana since 1986. We arrange tailored birding trips to Rancho Grande, the plains (Llanos), the Andes, the mountains of Paria, Lake Maracaibo basin, Perija mountains, Brownsberg reserve, Iwokrama, the Orinoco Delta and one of the premier endemic bird areas of the continent: the tepuis. We are the experts in Sierra de Lema, Roraima, Gran Sabana, Auyan tepui and many other of these incredible table top mountains.

Ascanio Birding Tours is the only company that seriously ties bird tourism with research and conservation in Venezuela. Based on a board decision, every fiscal year we invest no less than 20% of our profits in research projects and conservation programs with several Venezuelan NGOs, including the Venezuela Audubon, Aves de Venezuela and the Phelps Ornithological museum. In addition, we usually support students participation in professional events such as ecology congresses, field stations and workshops.

Sounds awesome!

Crimson-crested Woodpecker in French Guiana

2010-02-08T00:59:00.000-05:00

Originally posted 1/31/11 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

Campephilus melanoleucos, originally uploaded by mazama973.

Here's a nice photo of a female Crimson-crested Woodpecker taken in northeast French Guiana by Michel Giraud-Audine and posted here with permission. French Guiana lies north of Brazil and east of Suriname on the northeast coast of South America. The Red-necked Woodpecker is the other member of the Campephilus genus that can be found there.

Crimson-Crested Woodpecker, Chilling Out!

2010-02-08T00:58:00.000-05:00

Originally posted 9/24/2010 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

Here is a video of a chilled-out Crimson-crested Woodpecker. It is a male bird as indicated by the entirely red head with a small black and white patch below the ear. Many thanks to David Ascanio, who posted this video recently at the Internet Bird Collection.

He made it in El Manteco, Bolívar State, Venezuela.

Crimson-crested Woodpecker

2010-02-08T00:54:00.000-05:00

Carpintero real picoamarillo [Crimson-crested Woodpecker] (Campephilus melanoleucos melanoleucos) (♂), originally uploaded by barloventomagico.

Here is a male Crimson-crested Woodpecker, taking in some sunshine. The photographer noted the place of this photo as La Pomarrosa Farm, Barlovento, north center Venezuela. Creative Commons licensed photo.

Crimson-crested Woodpecker

2010-02-08T00:52:00.000-05:00

Crimson Crested Woodpecker, originally uploaded by crookrw.

A male Crimson-crested Woodpecker, seemingly pausing for his portrait. Creative Commons licensed photo.

Crimson-crested Woodpecker

2010-02-08T00:50:00.001-05:00

This photo originally uploaded by leo! on Flickr.

Here is a beautiful photo of a female Crimson-crested Woodpecker sitting on a bare tree trunk.

And let's take a closer look at her marvelous red and black crest! Creative Commons licensed photo.

This photo originally uploaded by leo! on Flickr.

Crimson-crested Woodpecker with Raised Crest Feathers

2010-02-08T00:46:00.000-05:00

Originally posted 9/10/2010 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

Playing hide 'n seek #4, originally uploaded by wmlub.

Here's a very nice photo of a female Crimson-crested Woodpecker raising her black and red crest. It's no surprise that woodpeckers can raise and lower their crest feathers. But the fact that the crest is relaxed, or lowered, more often than it is raised makes photos like this one quite uncommon! Thanks to wmlub for granting permission to post his photo here.

Crimson-crested Woodpeckers - Ladies Club

2010-02-08T00:42:00.000-05:00

ladies club, originally uploaded by brodmann's 17.

Many thanks to brodmann's 17 from Flickr for granting permission to post this amazing photo of two female Crimson-crested Woodpeckers here.

The Crimson-crested Woodpecker, Light and Dark-billed

2010-02-08T00:40:00.000-05:00

Originally posted 8/7/10 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

I hope that you are enjoying whatever season it happens to be wherever you are in the world. It's been quite a while since my last post because I've been on vacation in northwestern Spain and Portugal, where I was hoping to see the Great Spotted Woodpecker (Dendrocopos major) and the Green Woodpecker (Picus viridis), each for the first time.

Fortunately, I found them in Galicia, Spain (GSWO, in a recently burned section of a pine forest) and in Ponte de Lima, Portugal (GRWO, in a riparian forest), both in the very early morning hours. I was thrilled to see them, though my photos of the birds are nothing special.

You can see super photos and read numerous posts on both birds over at Woodpeckers of Europe at these links:

Great Spotted Woodpecker

Green Woodpecker

Now, back to those woodpecker's larger relatives, within the Campephilus genus, here are two illustrations for you.

Light bill, dark bill. These illustrations from Alfred Mahlerbe's Monographie des Picidées both depict the Crimson-crested Woodpecker (so far as I can tell!). The nominate species with the greyish-ivory to almost white bill appears above, and it has a range in South America east of the Andes mountains, south to Argentina and Brazil. A subspecies is illustrated below, and it is named after Malherbe. It has a dark grey to brown-grey bill and ranges from western Panama to north and west Columbia.

These illustrations are within the public domain and appear here courtesy of the Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Columbia University in the City of New York.

Reference

- Woodpeckers: A Guide to the Woodpeckers of the World by H. Winkler, D. A. Christie & D. Nurney

Confusion Species - Lineated Woodpecker

2010-02-08T00:36:00.000-05:00

Carpintero real barbirrayado [Lineated Woodpecker] (Dryocopus lineatus lineatus) (♂), originally uploaded by barloventomagico.

The Lineated Woodpecker (Dryocopus lineatus), a relative of the Pileated Woodpecker (Dryocopus pileatus), is often confused with the Crimson-crested Woodpecker, and vice versa. But by comparing this picture with those of the Crimson-crested Woodpecker, the differences do become obvious. The red mustache and full red crest of this bird tells us it's a male. Creative Commons licensed photo.

Two Woodpeckers, in Mexico

2010-02-08T00:34:00.001-05:00

Originally posted 1/4/10 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

UPDATE: After posting this photo, a friend of mine expressed doubt that the topmost bird is a Lineated Woodpecker. For example, the tail feathers much more closely resemble those of a Pale-billed Woodpecker. Also, the white markings on lineateds do not typically come together in the "V" shape apparent here on the bird's back whereas they do meet like that in pale-bills. So, based on appearance alone, I'd call both of these birds as pale-bills. In corresponding with John Lofgreen, he maintains that he did indeed observe and capture a Lineated Woodpecker as the upper bird in this image. In any event, it's an interesting and pleasing image that I'm grateful to have here.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Here is another photo that is extraordinary because it includes two species of woodpeckers that are rarely photographed together. The Pale-billed Woodpecker belongs to the Campephilus genus. The Lineated Woodpecker belongs to the Dryocopus genus (the same genus that Pileated and Black Woodpeckers belong to). These two birds look similar and so are confusion species. It is not uncommon to see each bird listed as the other species on photos posted on the web.

Many thanks to John Lofgreen of Anchorage, Alaska for sharing this photo here. He almost caught a third woodpecker species with these two! As he wrote:

This is another photo from Singayta. The lower bird on the left, is a Pale-billed Woodpecker. The upper bird is a Lineated Woodpecker. This was the last photo on that roll of film. While I was changing rolls, a Golden-cheeked Woodpecker landed next to them, but all three birds were gone before I was ready to shoot again. What a photo it would have been.

John is a published wildlife artist. You can find more of his beautiful work here:

at his site John Lofgreen Wildlife Art and at his blog The Life of a Painter

Singayta is a good bird watching location close to San Blas, Nayarit on the west coast of Mexico.

http://www.singayta.com/

Crimson-crested Woodpecker

2010-02-08T00:32:00.000-05:00

Crimson-crested Woodpecker, originally uploaded by Charles Hesse.

Many thanks to Charles Hesse for granting permission to post this photo of a male Crimson-crested Woodpecker from Llanos de Moxos, Beni.

A Pair of Crimson-crested Woodpeckers

2010-02-08T00:18:00.000-05:00

Originally posted 4/2/10 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

Home building, originally uploaded by fredshome.

Here is a pair of Crimson-crested Woodpeckers at their nest hole. The female bird is on the right. Creative Commons licensed photo.

Crimson-Crested Woodpecker

2010-02-08T00:15:00.000-05:00

Originally posted 7/11/10 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

Crimson-Crested Woodpecker, originally uploaded by Billtacular.

A male Crimson-Crested Woodpecker stands out very well in this photo by Billtacular, posted here under Creative Commons license.

Guayaquil Woodpecker

2010-02-07T00:26:00.002-05:00

Originally posted 4/10/10 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

I'm very grateful to Dubi Shapiro who shares this fantastic photo of a male Guayaquil Woodpecker with us, photographed at Milpe Reserve, Choco region.Ecuador on January 15, 2009. Dubi has a remarkable collection of wildlife photography that is most definitely worth a look!

View Dubi Shapiro's photos here at pbase

Guayaquil Woodpecker

2010-02-07T00:22:00.000-05:00

Recorded 1 April 2006
Location Rio Silanche, Pichincha Province, Ecuador
Duration 26 sec

A male Guayaquil Woodpecker in a tree.

Guayaquil woodpecker

2010-02-07T00:18:00.000-05:00

Guayaquil woodpecker, originally uploaded by joel n rosenthal.
Many thanks to Joel N. Rosenthal for granting permission to post this photo of a male Guayaquil Woodpecker.

Guayaquil Woodpecker

2010-02-07T00:16:00.000-05:00

Recorded 1 April 2006
Location Rio Silanche, Pichincha Province, Ecuador
Duration 25 sec

This female Guayaquil Woodpecker looks very similar to a female Crimson-crested Woodpecker but the latter bird's crest is colored black from its forehead to the center, as depicted in this photo.

Guayaquil Woodpecker in Flight

2010-02-07T00:14:00.000-05:00

guayaquil in flight, originally uploaded by brodmann's 17.

It's quite rare to find photos of Campephilus woodpeckers in flight. Many thanks to brodmann's 17 from Flickr for granting permission to post this spectacular photo of a male Guayaquil Woodpecker here!

Guayaquil Woodpecker Video

2010-02-07T00:13:00.001-05:00

Originally posted 10/29/10 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

In this brief video of a male Guayaquil Woodpecker at the Ayampe River in Ecuador, you'll observe it looking around and drumming. This video by videoclientesm includes a link in its description to a bird tour site called Sword Billed Expeditions. Press play, then change the setting at the lower right of the video box from 360p to 480p to watch it at higher resolution.

Birds of Peru by Thomas S. Schulenberg describes the typical voice and drumming of this bird as follows:

Call like that of Crimson-crested Woodpecker. Drum is heavy, dying away at the end, 4-7 strikes.

Check out this audio sample of a bird doing 5 loud, crisp drums from xeno-canto:

Are those Howler Monkeys near the end, at 1 min 30 secs, of this clip? It sounds like Jurassic Park. Wow!

Guayaquil & Red-necked Woodpecker Illustration

2010-02-07T00:12:00.000-05:00

Originally posted 11/24/10 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

The large bird depicted in this hand-colored lithograph by Delahaye appears in Alfred Malherbe's Monographie des picidées (1859-1862). It is a Guayaquil Woodpecker, listed here with its old name Mégapic de Sclater. Curiously, the sex of the bird is noted as male, and that appears to be an error. The male Guayaquil Woodpecker's head is entirely red, but for a small black and white patch below its ear. The female Guayaquil Woodpecker possesses a white band extending from the base of its bill to its white neck stripe.

The two pairs of birds in this illustration are two subspecies of the Red-necked Woodpecker. While most of the illustrations in this work are excellent, these do not quite capture the splendid appearance of this bird. It must have proved very challenging to draw these relatively large birds to such a small scale!

This image within the public domain appears here courtesy of the Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Columbia University in the City of New York.

Guayaquil Woodpecker

2010-02-07T00:10:00.000-05:00

big redhead, originally uploaded by brodmann's 17.

Many thanks to brodmann's 17 from Flickr for granting permission to post this striking photo of a male Guayaquil Woodpecker here

Le Mégapic-Impérial et Le Mégapic à Bec d’Ivoire

2010-02-06T00:45:00.000-05:00

Originally posted 2/26/10 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

Illustration courtesy of the Division of Rare and Manuscript Collections,

Cornell University Libraries.

http://rmc.library.cornell.edu/ornithology/guide/hillguide16.htm

The magnificent Imperial Woodpecker is depicted in this hand-colored lithograph from French naturalist Alfred Malherbe's four-volume work, Monographie des picidées (1859-1862). There is another illustration and more information about the work available here at this link.

The largest woodpecker in the world, the female Imperial Woodpecker is shown in full with her tongue extended, contrasted with the male whose crest is red and black. In the background, male and female Ivory-billed Woodpeckers are depicted in what certainly appears to be an adaptation of John James Audubon's painting of the birds in 1826.

Tim Gallagher on the Imperial Woodpecker

2010-02-06T00:42:00.001-05:00

Read a story about the majestic Imperial Woodpecker.

Read the Full Article

Tim Gallagher is editor-in-chief of Living Bird, the Cornell Lab of Ornithology's quarterly magazine. He's also the author of the book "The Grail Bird: The Search for the Ivory-billed Woodpecker" (Houghton Mifflin, July 2005). For more info on the illustration, see the article or click here.

Imperial Woodpeckers

2010-02-06T00:39:00.000-05:00

This rather large image befits the Imperial Woodpecker, the largest woodpecker in the world. According to Wikimedia Commons, this chromolithograph appeared in The Auk in 1898, and the artist was John Livzey Ridgway (1859-1947) an American illustrator and brother of ornithologist Robert Ridgway. Public domain image.

Imperial Woodpecker, Close Up

2010-02-06T00:37:00.000-05:00

Originally posted 8/9/10 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

I just came across this specimen photo, a close up of a female Imperial Woodpecker head from the Museum für Naturkunde Berlin and shared with us here by Dysmorodrepanis through Wikimedia Commons. The largest of all the woodpeckers, the bird you see here is a very old specimen, but spectacular nonetheless. How much more spectacular would it be to see it in action, live in a pine forest in Mexico today?

Here's a link to a related article from 2003 about a search for the Imperial Woodpecker by BirdLife International that's an interesting read:

Imperial Woodpecker story

Also, here is a more recent post regarding a report of an Imperial Woodpecker sighting in the Copper Canyon in Mexico:

Imperial Woodpecker Reported in Mexico

Imperial Woodpeckers

2010-02-06T00:36:00.001-05:00

This is an image of male and female Imperial Woodpecker specimens from the Museum Wiesbaden in Germany. The photographer was Fitz-Geller Grimm, shared with us here by Creative Commons license.

EXTINTOS!

2010-02-06T00:35:00.000-05:00

Originally posted 6/17/10 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

EXTINTOS!!!, a photo by telly gacitúa on Flickr.

Sad but true, as the comments that accompany this beautiful image posted here under Creative Commons license note:

El carpintero Imperial, el zorro Guará, el Tilacino, el pájaro Dodó, el Sapo Dorado de Monteverde, el Bilby Menor, el ciervo de Schomburgk, el Alca Gigante, el Tigre de Java, el Baiji o delfín de río chino, el Barbus Microbarbis y la orquídea extinta.
Llegaron los humanos y los mataron a todos!!!!!

The Imperial Woodpecker, Fox Den, the Thylacine, Dodo bird, the Golden Toad of Monteverde, the Bilby Minor Schomburgk Deer, the Great Auk, the Tiger of Java, the Baiji or Chinese River Dolphin, the Barbus Microbarbis and orchid extinct.
humans came and killed them all !!!!!

La Tête et Le Pied du Megapicus Imperialis

2010-02-06T00:34:00.001-05:00

Originally posted 6/13/10 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

I was pleasantly surprised to find this illustration of the head and foot of an Imperial Woodpecker, accompanied by the same for the Black Woodpecker of Europe (Dryocopus martius) for comparative purposes in the preface of Alfred Malherbe's Monographie des Picidées. The image above is within the public domain and it appears here courtesy of the Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Columbia University in the City of New York.

The Imperial Woodpecker, the largest woodpecker in the world, is the subject of an earlier post here at Campephilus Woodpeckers and, appropriately, the subject of the first plate within Monographie des Picidées:

While we're on the topic, recently Mark Michaels made the following post at the Ivory-bill Researchers Forum that will lead you to a rarely seen still from a video of the Imperial Woodpecker that belongs to Cornell University. He wrote:

This recent publication from Partners in Flight includes a still from the footage of the Imperial Woodpecker on page 11. It should have some relevance for IBWO searchers. Another still appears in Snyder's Travails of Two Woodpeckers, but as far as I know this is the first time any of the images has appeared online.

Find the publication here at this link.

Also, here is a link to the organization's website: http://www.savingoursharedbirds.org/

To my knowledge, this is the sole imagery available of the Imperial Woodpecker aside from illustrations and images of museum specimens, so it's quite a wonder!

Imperial Woodpecker - 3D View at Naturalis

2010-02-06T00:33:00.000-05:00

Naturalis is the website of the National Museum of Natural History in the Netherlands. At Naturalis, you can find 3D images of specimens from the Zoological Museum of the University of Amsterdam including an Imperial Woodpecker, a Cuban Ivory-billed Woodpecker and a US Ivory-billed Woodpecker . See this one, for example:

Imperial Woodpecker - 3D View

Imperial Woodpecker Reported in Mexico

2010-02-06T00:30:00.000-05:00

Over at the Ocellated blog, you can find a post about one of the most recent Imperial Woodpecker sighting reports, from 2005, along with some interesting discussion.

Click here for the post.

Ivory-billed Woodpeckers

2010-02-05T23:30:00.003-05:00

This is the famous painting of 1 male and 2 female Ivory-billed Woodpeckers from John James Audubon's Birds of America.

Ivory-Billed Woodpecker Specimen at Harvard

2010-02-05T01:12:00.001-05:00

Originally posted 2/28/11 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

Ivory-Billed Woodpecker, originally uploaded by hyperion327

This impressive looking, male Ivory-billed Woodpecker specimen is on display at the Harvard Museum of Natural History in Cambridge, Massachusetts. According to the Onithology Information System (ORNIS) database, a total of 260 North American and 9 Cuban ivorybill specimens collected from March 7, 1844 to December 6, 1935 are housed in North American collections (not including any specimens that are housed in museums in Cuba). Most specimens were collected in Florida in the late 1800s to early 1900s.

The Top 5 holders of ivorybill specimens, according to ORNIS are:

Harvard, MA - 72
The Field Museum, IL - 38
The Smithsonian, DC - 35
American Museum of Natural History, NY - 27
The Academy of Natural Sciences, PA - 20

With regard to collecting any animal that has become endangered or worse, we'll probably never know how many were enough to collect, and how many were excessive.

From the ORNIS site:

Over 5 million bird specimens are housed in North American collections, documenting the composition, distribution, ecology, and systematics of the world's estimated 10,000-16,000 bird species. Millions of additional observational records are held in diverse data sets. ORNIS addresses the urgent call for increased access to these data in an open and collaborative manner.

Visit ORNIS here.

Photo by hyperion327, posted here under Creative Commons License.

Ivory-billed Woodpecker: Tim Gallagher Interview, plus a Lament from the Past

2010-02-05T01:10:00.000-05:00

Originally posted 3/30/11 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

Tim Gallagher, ornithologist and author of The Grail Bird, relates his famed sighting of an Ivory-billed Woodpecker in the Big Woods of Arkansas, seven years ago, in a brief portion of this recent podcast by CBC Radio. The interview begins about 6 mins into the podcast.

Go to the interview here.

The illustration at right is from an article entitled The Passing of Birds by Eugene Strong Rolfe which appeared in The Bay State monthly (1900), now in the public domain. Rolfe's piece contemplates extinct and endangered wildlife at a time of rampant specimen collecting in the USA stating that:

It is with keen regret that the mind contemplates the total extirpation of types that have heretofore ministered to our necessities or pleasures.

This interesting albeit sad read can be found starting on page 413 of the monthly (page 430 of the pdf document), available for browsing or free download at Google books.

Find this edition of the Bay State monthly here

Ivory-billed Woodpecker Search - Project Coyote Update

2010-02-05T01:09:00.000-05:00

Originally posted 3/18/11 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

In February, I spent just over a week in east-central Louisiana with a couple of good friends in our ongoing search effort (dubbed Project Coyote) for the Ivory-billed Woodpecker. Our trip report includes several images of trees of interest and habitat, and a sound file of two possible double knocks that I heard in the field, but which are rather soft in volume on the recording.

Follow this link to find the update posted on March 17, 2011: Project Coyote Updates

Photo taken in Singer Tract, Louisiana by Arthur A. Allen (April 1935).

Visiting Louisiana in the wintertime usually gives this New Yorker a welcomed break from the cold! This time, the first half of the trip was frigid, with overnight temperatures in the 20s before it warmed up considerably for the rest of our days there. I enjoyed meeting a few fellow searchers for the first time over dinner. Of course, I always feel fortunate to spend time exploring and enjoying the wildlife and scenery of the Louisiana forests.

On this trip, I saw dozens of armadillos roaming around the forest, rifling through the leaf litter with their long snouts looking for bugs and worms. They got me curious, and upon returning home, I was surprised to learn that there are around 20 species of armadillos in the Americas! The Nine-banded Armadillo you see here is the sole species that inhabits the USA.

Find more on armadillos here.

Nine-banded Armadillo originally uploaded by billy3001

Ivory-billed Woodpecker Photos by Arthur A. Allen

2010-02-05T01:08:00.000-05:00

Originally posted 1/16/11 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

Post updated on 2/1/2011

Wikimedia Commons has posted this photo and a few others of Ivory-billed Woodpeckers at the Singer Tract in Louisiana that were taken by Arthur A. Allen of Cornell University. This photo is accompanied with the following information at Wikimedia:

...Female Ivory-Bill returning to nest. Photo taken in Singer Tract, Louisiana by Arthur A. Allen (April 1935). From Recent observations of the Ivory-Billed Woodpecker (Auk) Volume 54, Number 2, April, 1937. This work is in the public domain because it was published in the United States between 1923 and 1963 with a copyright notice, and its copyright was not renewed.

Find the Wikimedia entry here.

The full-text of the aforementioned article by Arthur A. Allen is easy to find (search using his name in the author field) at the Searchable Ornithological Research Archive (SORA). The image above and several other interesting images appear in the article. You can find it here:

SORA

Cornell offers more images of the Singer Tract in Louisiana and Ivory-billed Woodpeckers in its digital collections. Some are in color and the images are definitely worth a look. The entire collection of these images is not easy to retrieve with a single search, so try various keywords like ivorybill, woodpecker, and singer tract and a few searches if you want to find them.

Visit the Cornell University images here.

From past to present, Cornell shares details about a new book being written by leaders of the Cornell Lab’s Ivory-billed Woodpecker Recovery Project and partner organizations in the Autumn 2010 edition of Living Bird Magazine.

Find the Living Bird article here.

Also, Don Ware of the Choctawatchee Audubon Society has conveyed several reports of Ivory-billed Woodpeckers along the Choctawatchee River in Florida.

Read the article here.

Cuban Ivory-billed Woodpecker Photo by John Dennis

2010-02-05T01:06:00.000-05:00

Originally posted 1/16/11 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

Wikipedia has posted this photo by John Dennis with the following information:

...showing a male Cuban Ivory-Bill from a last remnant of Ivory-Billed Woodpeckers in Cuba (Auk) Volume 65, Number 4, October, 1948. This work is in the public domain because it was published in the United States between 1923 and 1963 with a copyright notice, and its copyright was not renewed.

Find the Wikipedia entry here.

On a related note, a post entitled Valle de Vinales at another blog says that Dr. Giraldo Alayon is currently working on a book about the Cuban ivory-billed Woodpecker.

Read the post here.

Ivory-billed Woodpeckers - A Podcast Interview with Ron Rohrbaugh from The Cornell Lab of Ornithology

2010-02-05T01:04:00.000-05:00

Originally posted 2/2/11 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

Many people find the history and biology of the Ivory-billed Woodpecker to be nothing short of fascinating. You'll either learn or be reminded why this is so by listening to this podcast interview with Ron Rohrbaugh, Acting Director of the Conservation Science Program at the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology. Brought to you by The Wilderness Center, part one of the interview is about 20 minutes long, and is available now at about 26 1/2 minutes into Episode 95. Part two in Episode 96 will be available on Thursday, February 3, 2011.

Click the logo below to find the podcasts.

The photo above by Arthur A. Allen is in the public domain according to Wikimedia Commons.

Ivory-billed Woodpecker - Project Coyote Update

2010-02-05T01:02:00.000-05:00

Originally posted 12/15/10 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

Cassell's Book of Birds (1873)

My friend Mark Michaels recently returned from a trip to the Ivory-billed Woodpecker search area in east-central Louisiana that he and other Project Coyote team members have been focusing on over the past year.

He's posted a trip report on the Project Coyote site, accompanied by several interesting photos, that details his further study of bark scaling characteristics and habitat quality assessments of nearby Wildlife Management Areas. Follow the link below for the full report.

Find the report here in pdf format, posted December 14, 2010.

Ivory-billed Woodpecker - Podcast Discussion

2010-02-05T00:58:00.000-05:00

Originally posted 10/15/10 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

Mark Bonta of Delta State University in Cleveland, Mississippi delivers very interesting commentary on the continuing search for the Ivory-billed Woodpecker along with the Delta blues in a new podcast discussion. Ivorybill comments begin just after 14 minutes into this podcast:

Geography of the Delta Blues and the Ivory-billed Woodpecker

I was pleased to discover this illustration, new to me, amid an extensive collection of antique bird illustrations and bird photos. The collection is available in a web album belonging to Avigraphicon at this link:

Avigraphicon's Public Gallery

Avigraphicon provides these notes on the book that this plate belongs to:

Captain Thomas Brown's illustrations following Alexander Wilson and Lucien Bonaparte's seminal text, originally published in the three-volume Jameson edition of the American Ornithology. These plates are from the later "Illustrations" volumes published between 1831 and 1835... Brown expanded the works of Wilson and Bonaparte to include 161 additional birds, and enlarged the illustrations of 87 others.

Link to the full version of these notes here.

Ghost Birds, by Stephen Lynn Bales

2010-02-05T00:54:00.000-05:00

Originally posted 11/17/10 - backdated to organize posts by topic.

If you're at all curious to know what it's like to successfully search for, find and study the Ivory-billed Woodpecker, then you will enjoy the new book Ghost Birds: Jim Tanner and the Quest for the Ivory-billed Woodpecker, 1935–1941 by Stephen Lynn Bales. I found it to be a truly fantastic read on so many levels.

The author has set up a site for the book here:

Ghost Birds

And, Cyberthrush has written a nice review of the book at Ivory-bills Live.

Read the review at Ivory-bills Live

If you read this at a later date and do not link directly to the review, you can find it in the post dated November 14, 2010 at Ivory-bills Live.