Woody the Woodpecker! (pics included)

[Steve Foss]

Many of my generation know that the daffy TV cartoon character Woody the Woodpecker was in fact modeled after the pileated woodpecker.

Here are a couple totally "woody" shots, followed by a simple classic pileated pose.

Remember woody's laugh? Ha-ha-ha-HA-ha, Ha-ha-ha-HA-ha, hahahahahahahaha.

All 20D, 100-400L IS, 400mm, iso400, f5.6. All were shot from the Spruce Road off Hwy 1 about 12 miles outside Ely. I always knew Woody was a punker! And no, no photoshop effects there. Just the way Woody does his do.

[buzzsaw]

Thats a nice male you got there Steve! I really like that last picture!

[Tom Wilson]

Awesome Sir, just awesome.

[MN Shutterbug]

Steve, how do you manage to get that close to a pileated woodpecker? I've seen maybe 3 of these critters in my lifetime and was never able to get close enough for a photo with a 600mm lens on my old Nikon 35mm. Do you use a photo blind or have you just become part of the forest so that they all consider you one of them?

[RussDaBuss]

AWESOME!! I love these birds. Never seen them up close like this, only darting thru the woods and of course hear them!! Nice...

[Steve Foss]

X, I use a Primos mouse squeak bulb call. You squeeze it and it makes mouse squeaks. I have it in my pocket on every nature shoot. The pileateds must have thought it was a young bird in distress, because they swarmed around me for 20 minutes before I filled a 2 Gb card and half a 1 Gb card with enough images to sell for five years. I've had similar luck with many species of birds and this call. In fact, I darn near had to fend off those pileateds with my 400mm because I got dive bombed a couple times.

[icehousebob]

Steve, I read an interview years ago of Walter Lance, the Woody Woodpecker artist. He got the idea while on his honeymoon. He and his wife were staying in a rustic cabin in the woods and a Piliated Woodpecker spent most of the time pecking on the cabin and driving them crazy. They couldn't chase it away. Well, he developed the character and his wife did Woody's voice for the cartoons. The disturbed honeymoon paid off pretty well for them.

[MN Shutterbug]

Thought I already replied again but it disappeared.

Steve, thanks for the advice - again. You are soon going to replace L.L. Rue as me hero.

I had forgot but I used to use a call with a recording of a screech owl and that used to bring in downy woodpeckers. This would probably work on pileateds too. I just need to find it, dust it off and head north, a long ways north. Don't expect to see me none too soon though. However, I do love the Ely area. I've camped there, fished there and vacationed there and love it more every time. I do envy you at times, just not in the middle of the winter. SW Mn gets cold enough.

[Swimmer]

Beautiful picks! I thought Woody Woodpecker was modeled after the formally extinct wood pecker that turned up recently in an Arkansas Refuge.?