Fun Facts about Hairy Woodpeckers

• The larger of two look alikes, the Hairy Woodpecker is a small but powerful bird that forages along trunks and main branches of large trees. It wields a much longer bill than the Downy Woodpecker's almost thornlike bill. Hairy Woodpeckers have a somewhat soldierly look, with their erect, straight-backed posture on tree trunks and their cleanly striped heads
• Hairy Woodpeckers are common in mature woodlands with medium to large trees. They also occur in woodlots, suburbs, parks, and cemeteries
• More than 75% of the Hairy Woodpecker’s diet is made up of insects, particularly the larvae of wood-boring beetles and bark beetles, ants, and moth pupae in their cocoons. Elsewhere, a little more than 20% of Hairy Woodpecker diet is made up of fruit and seeds. Hairy
• Woodpeckers are common visitors at feeders, eating suet and sunflower seeds.  Hairy Woodpeckers sometimes drink sap leaking from wells in the bark made by sapsuckers. They’ve also been seen pecking into sugar cane to drink the sugary juice.
• Hairy Woodpeckers typically excavate their nests in the dead stub of a living tree, especially trees with heartrot, or in a dead tree. The cavity is often in a branch or stub that isn’t perfectly vertical, with the entrance hole on the underside. This location may help keep flying squirrels and sapsuckers from trying to take over the hole.
• To bring Hairy Woodpeckers into your yard, try setting up suet, peanut, and black oil sunflower feeders, especially in the winter when food is scarce. If you have dead trees in your yard, or dead parts in a living tree, and if it’s safe to leave them standing, a pair of Hairy Woodpeckers might try to start a family there.