An Unclassified Flying Object observed in Bushiwck — Photo by Diego Cupolo
A curiously decorated aviator was spotted among local bird species like the House Sparrow and the European Starling, this morning in a backyard near Bushwick Avenue and Linden Street.
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The red-headed bird was observed flying between several trees and pecking repeatedly at their bark. While the species has yet to be classified, the bird’s distinctive wing feather patterns are similar to those of the Ladder-Backed Woodpecker and Nuttall’s Woodpecker – two species that normally reside in western states.
Scientists also noted a variety of activity in the same backyard while studying the “wood-pecking bird.” This included an inconsequential meeting between three stray felines (two of which were twins), a noisy fight among four house sparrows, an aging Beagle jumping a fence only to urinate after exploring the courtyard with his nose, and the slow growth of small green pods on surrounding plant life.
Queens Crapper April 17th, 2009 at 9:49 am
It’s a male Yellow-bellied Sapsucker. The female lacks the red patch on the throat.
Rob April 17th, 2009 at 10:00 am
The woodpecker in the photo is a Yellow-bellied Sapsucker. They are a fairly common winter resident of NYC. Most are beginning to migrate through and out of the city to their northern breeding grounds.
Jimmy Legs April 17th, 2009 at 10:20 am
for the past two days i’ve been hearing this hammering sound somewhere in the vicinity of my backyard, which is down on eldert. i suspected it could be a woodpecker but the sound is so mechanical i thought maybe somebody’s been running a jackhammer. now i’ve got precedent.
Diego April 17th, 2009 at 11:56 pm
Sapsucker! Well, it must be evolving because I saw it pecking!
dido April 20th, 2009 at 5:09 pm
Friends on Long Island tell me, from personal experience, how woodpeckers can be very destructive to wood framed buildings. I hope this pecker is roosting in back of a masonry building. I have lived here for five years and I find the seeming influx of birds(or did we just not notice) like this woodpecker and “Bushy” on nearby Palmetto very exciting and hopeful.
Queens Crapper April 26th, 2009 at 10:56 am
It has to peck through the wood first to get at the sap!