![]() Nearly identical in patterning to the hairy woodpecker. Birds of the Pacific Northwest are tinged gray on the back and gray-buff below. Pacific coast birds have reduced white spotting on the wing coverts and secondaries such white spotting is most highly developed in birds east of the Rockies. Southeastern birds are smaller and slightly grayer below than boreal and northeastern birds. ![]() The 7 subspecies differ mainly in size (northern birds generally larger), underpart color (white to gray tinged), amount of black in rectrices, and amount of white spotting in wings. Juvenile: as in other pied woodpeckers, both sexes have a pale red patch in the center of the crown, more extensive in male. Male has a small red nuchal patch, lacking in the female. ![]() Outer tail feathers white with limited black spotting variable white spotting on the upperwing coverts and barring on the remiges. Underparts unmarked white (to grayish buff in some populations). Adult: black crown, auricular and malar upper back, scapulars and rump black, but a broad white stripe extends down the center of the back. The small size and often acrobatic foraging on small branches and twigs are distinctive, and the plumage pattern can be confused only with the hairy. In all respects it suggests a small version of the hairy woodpecker, both differing from our other species by the broad white stripe down the back. Our smallest woodpecker, the downy is also among our most widespread and familiar species it is a confiding bird that often visits feeders.
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