Woodpeckers · Netherlands
Great Spotted Woodpecker
Grote bonte specht · Dendrocopos major
Through my lens
Drumming before the leaves come
Long before the trees are green, the woods carry a short, hard drumroll. That is the Great Spotted Woodpecker, hammering on a dead branch to claim its patch.
It wedges pine cones into cracks in the bark to pick them apart, and usually carves a fresh nest hole each spring. The old ones are soon taken over by tits, starlings and nuthatches.
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