Bird of the Month: Great Spotted Woodpecker John Mcewen

Nothing has altered general knowledge of the natural world more than the documentary nature film.

How magical Disney’s True-life Adventures (1948-60) were. The revelation of movement when ducks skidded into one another on ice was as funny as Laurel and Hardy.

Technological advance has helped subsequent documentarists answer the public taste for sex, violence and impending doom, turning once-jolly Sir David Attenborough into a global Jeremiah. Nature’s copulation and killing, plus the garbageladen evidence of humanity’s laying waste the planet, mean innocent pleasure has been replaced by a Darwinian nightmare.

One of the unwanted revelations of the BBC’S Springwatch has been that the great spotted woodpecker ( Dendrocopos major) is a killer. Eggs and nestlings are to its taste, and daily inspection of a nesting box crammed with baby blue tits had a sinister, pre-planned edge. Any nestling of a suitable size, however well concealed, can be endangered, as was shown when a clutch of treecreepers was dispatched.

A century ago, Lord Grey and WH Hudson knew nothing of this blot on the bird’s character. For Hudson, its worst crime was to ‘steal cherries’. Even Mark Cocker in Birds Britannica (2005) wrote, ‘Sometimes its feeding habits take us completely by surprise,’ quoting Nick Richardson’s account of a great spotted killing other birds’ nestlings to feed its own.

That we know so much more about it is also due to its greater prominence. From 1967 to 2010, numbers quadrupled. It has even crossed the Irish Sea to breed in Northern Ireland (2006), the Republic of Ireland (2009) and the Isle of Man (2010). Only the barren reaches of the Highlands and Islands defy it.

Among explanations for this expansion are: the national decline of starling numbers – hence more vacant tree-hole nesting sites; the spread of conifer forestation – fir-cone seeds are a helpful winter food; the availability of decayed wood through deciduous tree diseases; and urban bird-feeders.

Unpicky and adaptable, the great spotted can hang upside down on suet balls if its favourite peanuts are unavailable. Flamboyant plumage – the red neck patch distinguishes the male; red caps, juveniles – always makes its visits a sensation. In 1951, the ornithologist Max Nicholson argued for the more accurate name ‘pied woodpecker’ – a campaign worth reviving.

Its sharp jick call and bouncy flight are immediately recognisable. It is the principal drumming woodpecker. Drumming signals availability – the noise is the most dramatic contribution of both genders to springtime. In 1943, Norman Pullen proved the drumming was made by beak on wood. Shockabsorbent tissue within the skull cushions impact. Sound volume depends on rapidity (5-20 per ½ second), not force.

The similarly plumaged but sparrowsized lesser spotted woodpecker ( Dendrocopos minor) has declined (some 1,000 survive) as dramatically as its bigger cousin has prospered (145,000). Landscape management has destroyed the lesser’s traditional woods and orchards. Fifty years ago, it was widespread up to Scotland.