Green Woodpecker

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The Green Woodpecker is a kind of mis-fit in its family: it hardly hammers away at trees and it spends much time on the ground.

This bird is a member of the woodpecker family. It also looks like a woodpecker, but it behaves differently. It mainly lives on the ground, where it's favourite food lives: ants and termites. The bird rarely hammers away at trees and is best recognized by its laughing sound. In many summers it will visit the lawn in my back garden a few times, because of the ants nests present there. The bird is very colourful, rather big and it is always a pleasure to see it.

This bird belongs to the family of Woodpeckers (Picidae). It is in our garden frequently and can be seen in Holland all year round. The bird is 13" and weighs 180 grams. It lives in woodlands, parks and orchards mostly. It eats ants. Compared to the male, the female has a black stripe on side of her head. The nest is made insade trees in April or May. And even though this is a big bird indeed, breeding the five to eight eggs only takes about 16 days. The chickens do stay in the nest much longer though: some 25 days.

Name of this bird in various other languages
Dutch	German	French	Polish	Scientific
Groene specht	Grünspecht	Pic cendré	Dzieciol zielony	Picus viridis