The Northern Flicker

Description

At only half the size of the Pileated woodpecker, the Northern Flicker is still the second largest of the common woodpeckers of North America at 11-12 inches in length. In the eastern and northern part of North America, the golden-shaften variety is common while the red-shafted variety is more common in the west.

The rest of the flicker is gray and brown with black striped markings across the back. The underside is light grey or pale tan with darker speckles. The common Northern Flicker has a black or red mustache and in birds with a black mustache, a red patch at the back of the neck.

Territory

Northern Flickers are found pretty much anywhere in North American where there are trees, but they prefer to live at the edge of forests where is access to open ground. They are highly adaptable to clearcuts, farmland, pine forests, alpine meadow, and urban and suburban living.

This is a migratory species, leaving their northern territories beginning as early as August and finishing their migration in the southern US and Mexico as late as November.

Behavior

Northern Flickers are ground foragers and have a thinner and slightly more curved bill than their tree foraging cousins. They are ant eaters, forcing their bills into the subterranean nests and using their bristly, sticky tongues to glean all insects in range. They will also visit feeders and take fruit and berries from trees and bushes.

This type of woodpecker is a less able excavator than many of the other true woodpeckers. When they do excavate nests, they prefer dead trees with advanced decay, but flicker nests have also been found in an unusual assortment of pilings, poles, cliffsides, haystacks and wooden buildings.

Flickers will readily use nest boxes when offered. They do not seem to have any preferences for height, often nest at less than 9 feet in height, and will even nest at ground level. It takes a flicker pair as little as five days and as long as three weeks to excavate a new nest; the male does the majority of the work.

Quick facts

The two color variants of the Northern Flicker, red-shafted and yellow-shafted, were once considered different species. There is a range from southern Alaska to northern Texas, roughly following the Canadian and American Rockies, where the two subspecies interbreed. This so-called hybridization zone results in a number of mixed-up looking flickers that carry some features and markings from each with very little consistency from bird to bird.
The color variations between the yellow shafted and red-shafted Northern Flickers are the results of how each metabolizes certain chemicals in their food and is genetically encoded. The Gilded Flicker is considered a separate species and is limited to southwestern deserts where Saguaro cacti grow.
Usually seen in pairs or small family groups, during the late summer and fall the Northern Flicker will congregate into small flocks for migration.

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