NSIS: Florida's Common Land Birds

All the woodpeckers will visit feeders for seeds, nuts, fruit, and suet. All except the Pileated will use nest boxes although the Downy and Hairy rarely do.

Flickers often forage on the ground for ants which make up about half of their diet. They nest in dead trees and may be displaced by Starlings.

The Yellow-bellied Sapsucker drills concentric rings of holes around tree trunks to drink sap. Vertical lines of holes indicate where sap was found. The Sapsucker returns many times to drink the sap and eat the insects it attracts. Hummingbirds, titmice, and nuthatches also feed on the sap.

Red-headed Woodpeckers cache acorns, nuts, and insects.

Red-cockaded Woodpeckers are common only in a few areas with mature longleaf or slash pine forests. They excavate nests in the pines, usually those infected with a fungus that rots the heartwood. They drill around the entrance so that sap flows down the trunk which may help to discourage predatory snakes. They form small colonies. Nonbreeding members assist with the incubation of eggs and care of the young. Red-cockaded Woodpeckers have been listed as endangered since 1970.

The Ivory-billed Woodpecker is also listed as endangered. However, none have been seen in Florida for at least 30 years. There have been unconfirmed sightings, including in Cuba in the 1980's and in Louisiana in 2001. A sighting in Arkansas on February 11, 2004 was confirmed by at least fifteen other sightings by a research team.

name	area	season	diet/native food plants
Northern Flicker	NCS	SpSuFW-B	ants, other insects, fruits, nuts, seeds blueberry, dogwood, hackberry, hawthorn, oak, palms, pigeon plum, pine, red cedar, sassafras, sea grape, serviceberry, Tupelo, viburnum, wild cherry
Yellow-bellied Sapsucker	NCS	SpFW	sap, insects, fruit hackberry, holly, maple, pine, red cedar, sassafras, tuliptree
Downy Woodpecker	NCS	SpSuFW-B	insects*, fruit, nuts dogwood, hickory, hophornbeam, oak, pigeon plum, sea grape, serviceberry, Virginia creeper
Hairy Woodpecker	NCS	SpSuFW-B	insects*, nuts, fruit beech, fig, oak, pine, pond cypress
Pileated Woodpecker	NCS	SpSuFW-B	insects*, nuts, seed, fruit dogwood, elderberry, greenbrier, magnolia, mulberry, sassafras, water tupelo, Virginia creeper
Red-bellied Woodpecker	NCS	SpSuFW-B	acorns, fruit, insects, seed bald cypress, bayberry, beautyberry, blackberry, blackgum, cabbage palm, crabapple, dogwood, elderberry, elm, fig, grape, greenbrier, hickory, holly, maple, mulberry, pine, oak*, persimmon, pigeon plum, pine, red cedar, sea grape, sunflower, Virginia creeper, wax myrtle, wild cherry
Red-cockaded Woodpecker ENDANGERED	NC	SpSuFW-B	insects, seeds, fruit bayberry, magnolia, pine
Red-headed Woodpecker	NCS S	SpSuFW-B SpFW	insects, nuts, fruit beautyberry, beech, blackberry, blackgum, crabapple, dogwood, elderberry, fig, grape, greenbrier, hickory, magnolia, mulberry, oak*, pigeon plum, sassafras, sea grape, serviceberry, wild cherry, wild plum
N=north C=central S=south Sp=spring Su=summer F=fall W=winter B=breeds in Florida during season(s) underlined M=Migrant

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