Birdwatching - 3013 🐦

🦉 The black woodpecker (Dryocopus martius)

• Dryocopus (Greek): drys, dendron - tree; kopos, koptō - hit
• martius (lat.) : warlike, fighting; March

This big woodpecker looks very funny. Completely black coal plumage and a stylish red cap on the head. Moreover, in females this cap is small, like a yarmulke, and in males it covers the whole head like a mohawk. But especially funny and hilarious are its light eyes, which seem somehow crazy.

The woodpecker feeds mainly on ants, picking out their larvae from under the bark, but does not disdain longhorn beetles either. It is curious that its hollows later become a home for owls or bats - after all, it hollows them out deeply and carefully.