Woodpecker week!

[quetzal]

Several weeks ago I found the nest of a northern flicker at the local state park - this past weekend i got some up close shots of it. Here is the adult, I think its the male:




I got some pics of the young being fed as well as the adult, they're so cute:

[quetzal]

Then I came across a pair of Pileated woodpeckers, my first time for seeing this bird! I followed them all over the woods for about 20 minutes or so and was able to get some shots:










And last is a female red-bellied woodpecker that came to my feeder recently, this is one of the better shots I got of them:

[mn shutterbug]

You have some nice shots there. The first one is my favorite. It's also the sharpest. I'd love to get a good capture of a pileated someday. I've only seen one 3 times in my life, and never close up. Unfortunately, we don't have any in my area. Thanks for sharing.

One tip - try not to always center the subject. As a rule, but rules are made to be broken, there should generally be more room on the side that the subject is looking towards. It makes for better composition. Have you heard of the rule of thirds? This refers to the subject being in from the side and from the top or bottom, about 1/3. It's a little more pleasing to the eye. It's tough to remember while taking the photo, but you can usually crop accordingly during post processing. Other than that, I enjoyed them.

[Knight]

Wow the Flicker feeding her young is great The pair in the same tree is a first for me, i have never seen two at the one time before , good Captures

[Loupey]

"Wow", quetzal, as I look at the flicker series, then "WOW" even more as I see the pileateds!

I love the flicker series - would make a nice matted series piece.

As for the pileated - I've never seen an image with both the male and female pair in the same shot. I visited a large art show in my community this weekend where many photographers were selling their work. Many had pileateds but none with both parents. I've only seen a pair together but they were in flight.

Nice work :thumbsup:

[paulnj]

Great finds and even better images. I found a flicker nesting 1 tree away from a red-bellied last week at a job(I do treework), but no camera. I ate luinch watching both sets of parents feed the young.

[scott-devon]

Very nice set of shots, particularly that first one.

[quetzal]

Thanks for all the replies everyone, It was great fun getting these shots.
Minnesota scroller - thanks for the advice, I looked over the images again and see where I could improve on some.

paulnj - two woodpecker nests that close, that would have been cool to see.

Loupey - thanks; I'm hoping to go back again this weekend and see the Pileateds again. They're very loud and it was easy to follow them thru the woods and all. I've heard the call they make a few times before at this park but never saw the birds and didnt realize what kind of bird it was till I came across these guys.

Thanks again all!