Pygmy Woodpecker (Yungipicus kizuki) — identification, habitat & look-alikes

The Pygmy Woodpecker is a small East Asian woodpecker with a brown back crossed by white bars. It searches tree trunks and branches for insects and has no established wild population in the United States. It is also called the Japanese Pygmy Woodpecker.

Appearance

Appearance: It is about 5.1–5.9 in (13–15 cm) long, with a gray-brown crown, brown upperparts crossed by white bars, and streaking below. A male has a tiny red patch at the side of the nape, but it is often hidden.
Voice: Its buzzy, creaking call is often easier to notice than the bird itself.

Where it lives

Typical habitats: deciduous forest
mixed forest
wooded parks and gardens
Range: It occurs in eastern Asia, including Korea and Japan. It is not established as a wild bird in the United States.
Seasonal presence: Mostly within its Asian range
Preferred conditions: It uses many kinds of woods, from urban green spaces to natural broadleaf, conifer, and mixed forests, as long as trees provide places to forage and excavate cavities.

Behavior

Diet: It picks insects, spiders, and other small creatures from bark, branches, and leaves, and it also eats some seeds and berries.
Activity: It pecks at bark and probes small holes for prey. Its drumming is short and relatively soft.
Social life: Pairs and family groups keep in contact with soft calls. In fall and winter in Japan, it may join mixed-species feeding flocks.

Life cycle

Nest: A pair excavates a cavity in a dead branch or dead tree.
Clutch size: A study mainly around Tokyo found 2–5 eggs per nest.
Incubation: In that Tokyo-area study, both parents incubated for about 14 days.

Name and classification

About the name: It was also called Dendrocopos kizuki or Picoides kizuki.

Conservation

IUCN Red List: LCLeast ConcernLow risk of extinction

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