Woodpecker Pie

Like most kids of my generation, my first involvement with any woodpecker, let alone a Pileated, was through Woody Woodpecker cartoons. It took moving here to recognize that the jungle call I had heard during every summer visit was coming from this bird. Although about to leave and running late, the rare close-to-the-ground sighting required a quick photo.

Inside this woodpecker stump (or some other such name for the bottom twelve feet of a felled Red Oak left behind for wildlife) an agglomeration of carpenter ants. This tasty cache left the bird so focused that I was able to get close enough for a shot without any zoom -a rare moment, indeed.