Over the past month or so I have been visited by a pair of acorn woodpeckers (Melanerpes formicivorus). My home is among California Live Oaks and Monterey pines, so they are common to the area. These animated and vocal birds have been attracted to a feeder where I have easy access to view and photograph them in action.
Up to now I knew relatively little about them, other than the fact they collect and store acorns. But I have become increasingly fascinated by their striking beauty and behavior.
What I didn't know was which bird was the male and which was the female.
The sex of most birds can be identified simply by the fact that the ladies are the drabber of the two, while the guys don the colorful, fancy attire. With acorn woodpeckers, it does not seem to work that way. Both sexes are very similar in appearance.
Conspicuous red, black, and white markings on their face have earned them the nickname of the “clown faced woodpecker.” The difference between the sexes however lies in how these colorful feathers are distributed on the head.
In the split image below, the female has a band of black feathers on its crown, between the red at the top of the head and the white above the bill, whereas the male does not have this black band and the red extends down to the white. This makes for very easy identification and something I can now pass on to you!
