Woody's Cousin

A frequent visitor to the woods around our place is a Pileated Woodpecker. I guess the bark beetle-infested pine trees must be attractive to them. In any case, we had the chance for a really good look at one yesterday. Both of us just happened to be outside cleaning up some mess or another and heard the call from the bird as it flew through the trees across the street. Within minutes, it was lodged in a small Elder bush eating berries followed by a quick climb up the power pole where it sat, preening and enjoying the view, for several minutes. Both of us had time to get some pictures and watch it through the binocs, a very unusual situation, as most of the time all you get is a glimpse of one flying through the trees. We saw Pileated Woodpeckers on occasion in northern Saskatchewan, but here we see this guy (or gal) every few days. Kind of neat to see a woodpecker nearly the size of a chicken.

In other avian news, the Robins are flocking, the Canada Geese are honking and the Hummingbirds are long gone. Migration here isn't quite like it is on the Prairies, though. There are quite a few normally migratory birds that will stay here nearly all winter. A flock of Geese seems to stay at Mirror Lake, just down the road and of course Kootenay Lake doesn't freeze so there's open water all winter in this valley.