The rain bird

Val looks at a woodpecker that predicts when it will rain!

- Val Bourne

IT’S not very often that a British June turns out to be hot and sunny, but 2023 delivered sun and heat with a few heavy downpours thrown in. Normal play resumed in early July, when cool, blustery weather set in. The skies were grey and leaden, although little rain fell on my garden. It drizzled instead and that’s so frustrating for gardeners, because we like a long spell of gentle rain – preferably at night!

Every time the skies darkened close to the cottage, we were serenaded by the green woodpecker’s ‘laugh’ coming from the surrounding trees. No wonder this vision of green and red is called the rain bird. It calls when rain is in the air for a very good reason. Green woodpeckers like to feast on ants, ants and more ants, and rain moistens the soil and that makes it easier for them to probe the ground. They have long barbed tongues that scoop up the ants and ant eggs.

Green woodpeckers visit our large anthill in the meadow under the fruit trees. It was here when we moved in and it’s regularly scarred by their long beaks. Sometimes we have been lucky enough to see baby woodpeckers with a parent, but not this year. The youngsters are ugly ducklings to look at, because their mature plumage is not fully formed.