Oklahoma Vagrants: Acorn Woodpecker

ja-cob, ja-cob or wake-up, wake-up

Common in oak woods or mixed oak woods, this gregarious and clownlike appearing woodpecker gathers acorns to store in drilled poles, buildings, or trees.

Discovered in Oklahoma in 2012 at the Wichita Mountains NWR, as a single bird, it hasn't been seen since--yet.

                                                                 Acorn Woodpecker
                                                             Madera County, AZ 2018

Half of its diet consists of acorns and the other half is insects (usually ants), fruit, seeds, and sometimes eggs from other birds.  Acorns are stashed for the winter, which might stimulate the need to breed.  There are sometimes so many in granaries, they cannot all be eaten, and some will rot.  Others will be stolen, some will be lost, and others will be oak trees.  Acorn Woodpeckers will also consume sap from trees, as well as the insects found in the sap.  Sometimes they will even investigate the sap wells of sapsuckers.

Due to the huge cache, these locations will be guarded very well.  Thieves tend to include squirrels and jays.  Not all Acorn woodpeckers will use storage areas, sometimes just using natural tree cavities, and bark cracks will suffice.  If these sometimes magnificent stores are eaten, the woodpeckers will go to Mexico to winter.

During breeding season, family members will help with brooding and feeding, as well as other birds that might join together to defend the valuable storage granaries.  Older birds of the season might hold jobs as helpers to learn how to successfully raise young.  Breeding coalitions are usually brothers and sisters, and inbreeding is very rare, due to the nature of unsuccessful breeding.  When several females nest together, they generally deposit all eggs in one nest cavity.  When all the females begin to lay, they will no longer destroy eggs that might have been in the cavity.

Non-native species, like European Starlings, are always a threat to nest cavity success in woodpecker families, especially in urban and semi-urban areas.  Mature forests are paramount to the needs of these woodpeckers. Human preservation of oak and pine-oak stands are a necessity to the strength of the species, as well as conservation of snags and intact dead limbs.