Northern Flicker

About the Northern Flicker

The Northern Flicker is the woodpecker that forgot it was a woodpecker - a large brown, barred, spotted bird that spends most of its time on the ground, hopping across lawns and fields lapping up ants with a long sticky tongue. In flight it flashes a bright white rump and, in the eastern form, brilliant yellow under the wings and tail; western birds show salmon-red instead.

Flickers are loud and conspicuous, calling a ringing "wick-wick-wick" and a sharp "kleer," and drumming on anything resonant including gutters and chimney caps. They nest in cavities they excavate in dead trees, and their old holes house everything from bluebirds to Buffleheads.

In Texas the Northern Flicker is mostly a winter visitor to the eastern and central parts of the state from October through March, when yellow-shafted birds from the north pour in, while red-shafted birds hold the Trans-Pecos year-round and the two forms mix and hybridize in between.