The woodpecker has a long, pointed beak that it uses to bore holes in trees in order to find food. It is also known for its bright red crest and its black and white feathers. It is known for its distinctive drumming sound, which is made by its beak tapping against a tree trunk. It is found in many parts of the world, from North America to South America, Europe, Asia, and Africa. And for many birds, including most songbirds and woodpeckers, any size difference between males and females is fairly insignificant and may not be apparent unless the birds are side by side, if at all.The woodpecker is a medium-sized bird of the family Picidae. However, for birds of prey and shorebirds, it's the females that are larger. Birds are a bit of a mixed bag.įor most bird species, males are bigger than females, according to Stanford University. With most reptile and amphibian species, it's the females that are larger, Huffington Post reports. We often think of males as being larger than females, but this is generally only true among mammals. Size can also be a determinant between males and females of certain animal species. Among sexually dimorphic birds, it's generally the males that have more bright and bold colors. When male and females exhibit physical differences, that is a characteristic of sexual dimorphism. One of our woodpecker species, the red-headed woodpecker, is like the blue jay: Males and females look exactly the same, which in the animal kingdom is referred to as sexually monomorphic, according to Northern Arizona University. Male northern flickers have a black mark on either side of their face resembling a mustache, but females have no such mark. Similarly, male yellow-bellied sapsuckers have a red crown and throat, but females only have a red crown their throats are white. And male red-bellied woodpeckers have a red crown and nape, but females have only a red nape with a white crown, according to the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. Male downy and hairy woodpeckers both have a small red patch on the back of their head, but females of both species don't have this red patch. Subtle variations in color are common among our woodpecker species. On females, the red coloration stops on the top of the head, and the forecrown is instead black or gray in color, according to Cornell Lab. Both have red crowns, but on males the red color extends all the way down to their long bills. This is the most telling difference between the male and female birds.Ī more subtle difference between males and females can also be seen in their crowns if you can get a good enough look. However, if you can get a good look at their faces, you'll notice a red cheek stripe, similar to a mustache, on the males that the females lack, the Cornell Lab of Ornithology reports. The pileated woodpecker falls into this third camp.īoth male and female pileated woodpeckers are mostly black with black and white striping on their faces and a bright red crest. For still others, subtle differences can help us distinguish a male from a female. For others, like blue jays, males and females are virtually identical, making differentiating them by gender all but impossible. For some birds, like cardinals, males and females look markedly different, making them easy to tell apart.
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