A pileated woodpecker lands on the dead elm. She drums just below the old flicker den hole, then peers into it, moving her head all about.
pileated woodpecker
March 7, 2014
Is it my imagination, or do the juncos seem especially restless this morning? The distant roar of a military jet. A pileated taps on an oak.
March 1, 2014
Sallow sky; a yellow pustule of sun. In a tall oak, a pileated woodpecker bangs his head, attracting an entourage of smaller woodpeckers.
February 2, 2014
When I step out, a pileated woodpecker flies cackling from a nearby tree, his crest as bright as a stop light this gray and rainy morning.
December 17, 2013
The curious satisfaction of watching snow erase my own footprints. Up in the woods, the woodpeckers too are busy fixing what isn’t broken.
September 15, 2013
Cold at sunrise. A pileated woodpecker hitches up the trunk of tall locust, pausing to yell when he reaches the sunlit crown.
April 22, 2013
The hammer-blows of a pileated woodpecker opening up an oak. Peonies are sprouting in the garden, an infant’s pink, half-open fists.
March 27, 2013
Three pileated woodpeckers work the trees just inside the woods’ edge, inching up trunks and cocking their heads to listen before they tap.
March 5, 2013
A lone junco forages in the driveway. (Sick? A pariah?) The labored flaps of a pileated woodpecker coming in low over the yard.
February 18, 2013
Cold and clear. In the woods to the east, a loud dialogue of knocks: two pileated woodpeckers seeking admittance to dormant cities of ants.
November 2, 2012
With the leaves down, I can see deep into the woods: two pileateds work both sides of a birch. A redtail hawk flies just below the treetops.
October 25, 2012
The soft clatter of oak leaves on their way to the ground. Dull thumps as a pileated woodpecker excavates a hole, crest like a flaming axe.
August 27, 2012
A pileated woodpecker comes cackling into the dead elm, then quietly gets to work: hop down the trunk a few inches, listen for ants, repeat.
August 3, 2012
Green blur: a hummingbird. Two or three pileated woodpeckers cackle back and forth. The meter reader’s truck, its flashing yellow light.