Red-headed woodpecker
Melanerpes erythrocephalus
L 7½″
Habitat: Red-headed woodpeckers prefer to nest and roost in open areas. Farmyards, field edges, and timber stands that have been treated with herbicides or burned are preferred habitats. Redheads are attracted to areas with many dead snags and lush herbaceous ground cover, but not to woods with closed canopies. They are found throughout the East and along wooded streams of the prairie to eastern Colorado and Wyoming. Competition for nesting space is often intensive where starlings are abundant (Bailey and Niedrach 1965).
Nest: Red-headed woodpeckers most commonly excavate holes in the trunks of dead trees. Holes are excavated from 24 to 65 feet above the ground and the 1.8-inch diameter entrance hole often faces south or west (Reller 1972). These woodpeckers may excavate new holes each year, or use old nest sites.
Food: Red-headed woodpeckers consume about half animal matter (mostly insects) and half vegetable matter. Occasionally the eggs or the young of other birds are destroyed. Although a wide variety of vegetable matter is consumed, acorns from pin oak comprise a large portion of the winter diet. Nuts are stored whole or in pieces in cracks and crevices in bark, and in cavities which are sealed with bits of bark when full. These birds also store insects (especially grasshoppers) along with acorns in cavities and crevices (Kilham 1963, Bent 1939).