Dr. B. H. Warren (1890) first called attention to the orange-eating habit of the red-bellied woodpecker in Florida, where it is called the “orange sapsucker” or “orange borer.” He found on inquiry that these birds often destroyed large numbers of oranges when they were ready for picking and that “they damaged the orange trees by boring holes in them and sucking the sap.” He collected 26 of these woodpeckers in one orchard, 11 of which had “fed to a more or less extent on oranges.”
William Brewster (1889) saw a red-bellied woodpecker eating the pulp of a sweet orange at Enterprise, Fla. He says that it attacked the orange on the ground, pecking at it in a slow and deliberate way for several minutes. On examining the orange he found it to be decayed on one side. “In the sound portion were three holes, each nearly as large as a silver dollar, with narrow strips of peel between them. The pulp had been eaten out quite to the middle of the fruit. Small pieces of rind were thickly strewn about the spot. Upon searching closely I discovered several other oranges that had been attacked in a similar manner. All were partially decayed, and were lying on the ground. I was unable to find any on the trees which showed any marks of the Woodpecker’s bill.”
Certainly the habit of eating fallen and partially decayed oranges does no injury to the orange groves, but D. Mortimer (1890) tells a different story:
While gathering fruit or pruning orange trees, I frequently found oranges that had been riddled by this woodpecker, and repeatedly saw the bird at work. I never observed it feeding upon fallen oranges. It helped itself freely to sound fruit that still hung on the tree, and in some instances I have found ten or twelve oranges on one trees that had been tapped by it. Where an orange accidentally rested on a branch in such a way as to make the flower end accessible from above or from a horizontal direction the Woodpecker chose that spot, as through it he could reach into all the sections of the fruit, and when this was the case there was but one hole in the orange. But usually there were many holes around it. It appeared that after having once commenced on an orange, the woodpecker returned to the same one repeatedly until he had completely consumed the pulp, and then he usually attacked another very near to it. Thus I have found certain clusters in which every orange had been bored, while all the others on the tree were untouched.
The red-bellied woodpecker shares with other species, formerly included in the genus Melanerpes, the habit of storing acorns, nuts, insects, and other articles of food for future use. Ben. J. Blincoe (1923) writes:
The red-bellied woodpecker is a heavy feeder on beech and oak mast. In the early fall its incessant “Cha-cha-cha” was a familiar sound in the beech woods about Cherry Hill. I never observed it in the act of storing beech mast though on numerous occasions red-bellied woodpeckers were seen carrying beechnuts to a considerable distance from the trees from which they were secured. Very likely many of these nuts were wedged in cracks or crevices for future use. However, in the fall of 1913, a red-belly was seen storing the acorns from a Chinquapin Oak (Quercus acuminata) which stood over the wood-pile at Cherry Hill. The acorns were carried, one at a time, to fence posts ranging from twenty-five to three hundred yards distant from the oak tree, and were generally wedged in a crack in the post, usually near the top. One acorn was placed in a cavity caused by decay, and laid loosely on the rotten wood. As far as my observations went, but one acorn was placed in a single post
While Mr. Blincoe was shelling walnuts, he saw one of these woodpeckers carry off the shells, and apparently eat the remaining meat out of them. Several times he saw one stealing corn from his corncrib or flying off with cherries from a tree in his garden and sometimes carrying them to a fence post to eat. Again he watched one eating a hole in an apple, and “found that the apple on which it had been working bore a decayed spot near the stem and just at the edge of it, but entirely in the solid part of the apple, was a hole about half an inch across, and three-quarters deep. The bottom of this cavity contained several tiny holes, markings made by the woodpecker’s mandibles. In the early winter, frequently, a red-belly would be seen feeding on an apple that remained on the tree, though decayed and practically dried up.”
Lester W. Smith writes to me that it seems to be a habit of the red-bellied woodpecker in Florida to store away insects and other food. “After digging into and capturing an insect, I see it fly to a small hole, commonly in the trunk of the cabbage palmetto, and place the insect in it. At a hole 5 feet from the ground I found a male carolinus inserting the badly mutilated body of a cockroach. A large portion of his catches or finds he seems to prefer to hide away. A tree of small, late tangerines was visited almost daily during the latter half of May, and sections of the pulp, taken from fruit torn open by the mockingbird, were carried off and hidden in various places. On June 3 I saw carolinus go to the base of banana leaves, take out a section of pulp, and fly away with it. Examination showed other pieces similarly hidden, some with ants on them.”
M. P. Skinner (1928) says: “Although other woodpeckers carry off and store bits of food, the red-bellied woodpeckers appear to do it more than any others in the Sandhills. These birds are rather easily attracted to artificial feeding stations, especially if suet be offered them. They will eat nuts and bread crumbs, also, but not as greedily.”
Behavior.—Mr. Skinner (1928) writes: “In flight, these woodpeckers are apt to progress step by step from tree to tree. In this respect, and in that it is undulating, their flight is much like that of other woodpeckers. In approaching a perch, the red-bellied woodpeckers usually glide and sweep up to it with the impetus already gained. * * * These woodpeckers work and hammer on the trunks of trees, on the boles of oaks, on boles high up in live or blasted pines, and on both living and dead limbs, usually working up, but working down also if they want to, using a peculiar partly-sidewise drop downward.”