Seeing a new bird is always exciting. I knew we had black woodpeckers in the forest by their characteristic sound, but I had never seen one, so you can understand my excitement upon spotting one in the trees. The pics are taken at probably 70m distance, but do click for full size to see the fellow a little better.
©Giliell, all rights reserved
©Giliell, all rights reserved
©Giliell, all rights reserved
Wow! I don’t think we get them over here, but what a stunning bird.
What a bird, congratulations! I have, thus far, not been so privileged as to see one … no doubt, spending more than a couple of weeks on the European continent would help.
Large woodpeckers have always reminded me of their (very distant) reptilian cousins from the Mesozoic era. I have been lucky enough to hold (for ringing purposes) this guy’s North American cousin, Dryocopus pileatus and I felt like I was looking straight into the eyes of a pterosaur.
Wow, I have never seen a black woodpecker before.
Woodpecker?
Wood Ninja!
I has envy. I surely understand your excitement.
A magnificent woodpecker. In Finnish, this is called palokärki Kärki means tip and palo is the noun used for the event of something burning. So palokärki means, directly translated, firetip.
In Finnish, the English noun fire can be translated tuli, palo or tulipalo, tuli being the thing fire, palo being the event and tulipalo an event in which something (mostly a building) is on fire.
Starskeptic beat me to it :D! A lovely birdo!
Ice swimmer: thanks for the finnish lesson! (Reading that out loud, I think there is a joke in there, somewhere. But no sarcasm was intended!)
Ice Swimmer -- I’d translate palokärki “burning tip”, to distinguish from tulikärki or “firetip”, the fairly obsolete Finnish name coined for the new world Campephilus woodpeckers.
Hence, the famous ivory-billed woodpecker is “swamp firetip” (rämetulikärki) and imperial woodpecker is “emperor firetip” (keisaritulikärki) while the pileated woodpecker is simply “American burning tip”.
lumipuna @ 8
Yes, that’s a better translation.
Wow. What a good capture. I’ve never seen a black woodpecker.