[cobirds] Fun with Flickers

This is not a report of unusual birds, but I've had three recent observations of interesting Norther Flicker behavior that I thought would be fun to share.

In my yard a few days ago a flicker was attracted to suet hanging in a cage from the end of a branch. Apparently deciding he didn't want to, or couldn't, land on the cage itself, he perched directly over it, more than a body length away. He hung down and pointed his body and neck straight down and extended his tongue to the suet. The tongue darted in and out to a length that appeared to be over two lengths of the bill as he licked the suet. I'm not sure how much he got from the licking, but he stuck at it for several minutes. Other times flickers simply land on the cage and get bill fulls of suet; I'm not sure why this one did other wise. But it was fun to see that long pink tongue darting out so far!

About a week ago two flickers spent most of two hours foraging under the eaves of two moderately large buildings on the grounds of St.Mary Catholic Church in Littleton. They were after some morsels where vertical outside walls met roof overhangs. I've seen flickers work such niches before, but never in such a dedicated fashion over such a long period.

Lastly, yesterday a young female Cooper's Hawk perched in a tree near my home and was mobbed by three flickers that came to gather round its perch, taking a variety of aggressive postures, with much bobbing and bill pointing, some wing flashes, and a bunch of raucous calls. They never came less than 2 feet from the hawk, which seemed annoyed but unmoved.

David Suddjian

Littleton, CO

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