There are many animals on the planet Earth but I think the most interesting one is a bird called the Hairy Woodpecker. The Hairy is classified under birds and Woodpeckers. It is 16.5 to 26.7 cm long with a wingspan of 44.5 cm. Its tail length is 10.2 cm and its beak is about 3.4 cm. Hairy Woodpeckers’ wings have black with white dots on them. Its outer tail feathers chest, abdomen, back, and rump are white. On the male there is a red patch of feathers on the back of their head. Isn’t that neat? They are wildly distributed across North America, that’s a lot of woodpeckers.
Hairy Woodpeckers live in forested areas especially were there are dead trees standing. Not all of them migrate south though. In their habitat there are lots of trees and other animals such as, squirrels chipmunks and other birds. The Hairy has very strong neck muscles and its beak is also very strong. It has these features for cutting through hard wood without getting hurt.
Hairies eat many types of bugs. A couple kinds of them are hairy caterpillars, gypsy moths, ants, grasshoppers, and wood boring beetles. That’s a lot of little critters in their diet. The main way they protect themselves is using their strong beak. The hairy woodpecker has very few enemies but when say a squirrel comes they won’t be the nicest birds around. They peck at their enemy really hard until the enemy gives up. Have you ever seen a hairy Woodpecker on a bird feeder well if you have you would be very lucky because hairy Woodpeckers only live in forested areas? If they survive when they are young hairies can live a long life of 9 years. Hairy woodpeckers are born in eggs. When the eggs hatch the hairy woodpecker babies are blind, featherless, and hungry. Since they’re so hungry their parents feed them every two to three minutes. So the parents can’t be slacking or the babies could die.
Hairy woodpeckers at this moment are being born at a steady pace. There is a chance that they will be overpopulated in the future. One interesting fact I learned was that when they are pecking wood, to prevent from suffocating, they have feathers covering their nostrils. The hairy woodpecker continues to be one of my favorite animals on our planet earth.