Belted Kingfisher

Here's another Belted Kingfisher I met extremely late last fall. I've shown these guys before, and although it's easy to "encounter" these birds (a fleeting look at a fleeing bird, a long distance look across water, or hearing their trilling call), getting recognizable pictures is a less reliable endeavor.

People will sometimes try and get one of the birds they see identified though their descriptions match nothing in the area (or maybe nothing on the planet). A sighting of a "blue woodpecker" is an example of that. What could the bird have been?

  1. If it's a bird poking around on a tree, a Red-breasted Nuthatch or a White-breasted Nuthatch are strong candidates. Though more of a bluish-gray than a conventional blue, they navigate tree trunks adroitly like woodpeckers, and they are looking for insect food up there.
  2. A Blue Jay might store food like acorns in a tree for eating later in the season and are happy enough to eat insects on trees if they find them. But the Blue Jay is a species most people are familiar with, so they're probably not good candidates for being the "blue woodpecker".
  3. If you're not watching a kingfisher catching fish, I suppose their longish bills could make them a candidate for someone's "blue woodpecker".
  4. AFAIK the only truly blue woodpecker in North America is Woody Woodpecker.
December 16, 2021 at Duke Farms
Photo 174170218, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)


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