Weekly Woodpeckers Excitement and Stitch

I spent Tuesday on a visiting plant nurseries on a bus trip.  So I kitted up the Cedar Waxwing from "Birdsong I" so I'd have something to stitch while we were on the road.

Lots of woodpecker activity this week, so warning - lots of photos. 

The Downy Woodpeckers are by far the smallest of my woodpeckers.  But for their small size, they are pretty fierce and will not cede ground to much larger birds like the Steller's Jay on the left.

This is a female Downy.

As I hadn't seen one for over a week, I has pleased to have her stop by.

The female Hairy continues to be 'regular'. 

The male Hairy likes both the front and back feeders.  Besides larger nuts, he is also scarfing down shelled sunflower seeds.

Finally, I had some good looks at a Red-breast Sapsucker.

I think he looks rather frazzled here.

And here he is yet again.

I think the Starling on the right was supervising the Sapsucker's work.  

Don't you just hate having someone watching over your shoulder?

Finally, he can work as he pleases.

This photo is the cause of all my excitement. If you look closely there are two Acorn Woodpeckers on the right side of the tree, and one on the left side.

THREE ACORN WOODPECKERS!  

Sometime in 2015, my group of Acorn Woodpeckers decreased to just two birds; one male and one female.  In 2016 the pair did not fledge any youngsters, and I was worried that 2017 would be a repeat - no babies. 

But twice now I've seen three birds - two females (like the one above) and one male.

Two females will help tremendously with the odds of growing the colony in 2018.

I think this may be the young bird. 

Young Acorn Woodpeckers have blue eyes...

...older birds, like this male, have pink eyes.

Here's a female and male...

...and the third bird, another female.

Several times I've seen a group of three Flickers. 

No worries about the number of these birds.

They are pretty easy going and social birds.

This is the only photo I managed of a Pileated Woodpecker this week - a bird in flight. So all my woodpeckers are accounted for this week: Downy, Hairy, Sapsucker, Acorn, and Pileated.