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Female Woodie at last! (1 Viewer)

Neil Grubb

Neil Grubb

Well-known member
In previous threads I posted pics of a male GSW and two juveniles who became regular visitors to the table over the summer. I had only on one occasion ever seen the female in the garden. This morning she visited at last and obligingly showed me the back of her neck to confirm her identity! Her face markings are quite different to the juveniles so I'm fairly confident it isn't one of the kids grown up.
 

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Hi Neil, you're really lucky to have them visiting so regularly, i never thought id ever see a woodpecker in my garden (i live in a busy part of n.w.London) but two days ago i got up and happened to glance out of the back window and saw a Great spotted woodpecker, i nearly fell through the floor! Do you have any tips that might encourage him/her to stay?
Christine.
 
Hi, I now have both a male and female visiting each day - separately, male only touches the fat balls and female only the berry treat !!
 
christine said:
Hi Neil, you're really lucky to have them visiting so regularly, i never thought id ever see a woodpecker in my garden (i live in a busy part of n.w.London) but two days ago i got up and happened to glance out of the back window and saw a Great spotted woodpecker, i nearly fell through the floor! Do you have any tips that might encourage him/her to stay?
Christine.
Click to expand...

Hi, the woodpeckers seem especially attracted by peanuts. Having said that, it took several weeks before they were confident enough to frequent our feeders. Make sure the nut feeder is always full, and that the nuts don't go soggy if it rains. Also, I have found the woodies are very sensitive to movement - they fly off at the slightest motion. So your woodpecker may be around more often than you think - pick quiet times to look and be stealthy when you approach the window (to get the photos I have to crawl along the floor to the window, then raise my head very very slowly above the ledge before positioning the camera to get the shot. About 50% of the time I scare them despite being cautious, and 50% of the time I get a nice picture!)

To tell whether your woodie is a male or a female, look at the nape of its neck. If it has a red patch, it's a male. If there is no red patch, it's female (or a juvenile, which is obvious by its red cap!). See my pics on http://www.birdforum.net/pp_gallery/showphoto.php/photo/31593/sort/1/cat/500/page/2 (adult male)
http://www.birdforum.net/pp_gallery/showphoto.php/photo/31595/sort/1/size/medium/cat/500/page/2 (juvenile with adult male)
and the pic at the top of this posting to see the differences between them.
 
We get Great Spotted on the fat balls. The best was a lesser spotted using our old sink bird bath then dryig itself by rubbing on the lichen covered apple tree. We videoed it but its not digital so I cant show it.
 
She's a regular now! The last pic was poor because I had the camera set in the wrong mode-resulting in an underexposed pic that had to be photoshopped! These three pics show different poses and were taken in better light and with the correct exposure, and show her markings more clearly.
 

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Wow, brilliant pictures Neil, :clap: did chuckle about the crawling up to the window thing, thats dedication! I wonder if you could get some of that one way mirrored material to stick on the window, the woodies wouldnt see you and you could take pictures to your hearts content?
You may well be right, they may have been in my garden for some time i just haven't looked at the right time, maybe an early morning's in order, aaagh!!
Keep posting those photo's,

Christine :bounce:
 
'My' first woodpecker visitor is a female

In the past I have seen a woodpecker pass by my garden but never stop to feed, so last year I made a jumbo peanut feeder which is on a pole just over 8ft up near. Since then it has been used constantly by BT's, House Sparrows, Starlings etc, until last week (27 Oct) when I saw a female Great Spotted Woodpecker feeding at it for the very first time.

She has been back several times since then and the pictures I've taken suggest that she has a damaged foot (or leg). It doesn't seem to hinder her at the feeder as she uses her tail to steady herself. You can see a couple of the images in today's entry (3 Nov) in my garden diaries.

How much is this incapacity likely to be a hinderance when it comes to finding or keeping a partner, and producing offspring?

Cheers,
 
I had also meant to say about the problem of taking a picture without spooking the Woodpecker. My pictures were taken from my bedroom window, and what I did was to partially close the curtain and then used that as cover, opened the window very slowly.

Then it was a case of slowly poking the lens past the corner of the curtain - she didn't flinch, although I ought to say that the feeder is about 45ft from the window. That is a bit too far away and the picture has to be cropped quite a bit, but I am nervous about moving the feeder any closer. Perhaps I will try doing that (only by about 8ft) if/when she becomes a regular.
 

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Great picture David! I haven't had the two adults visit at the same time yet. My record is three at the table (two juveniles and their dad!!)
 
Neil Grubb said:
Great picture David! I haven't had the two adults visit at the same time yet. My record is three at the table (two juveniles and their dad!!)
Click to expand...

Thanks Neil - but don't be misled!

I should have made it clear that there is only the one WP, with two views pasted together to show her use of just the one foot - if you go to my website you can see the injured foot more clearly.

My fingers are crossed that she will let the 'local' male know about the peanuts, now that she is happy to come here.
 
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