That bongo drum rattle ricocheting through the woods in short bursts might be a pileated woodpecker, especially if there’s a handsome, crow-sized bird with a flashy red crest and smart white stripes around, clinging to a nearby tree. Pileateds can peck up to 20 times per second, banging their heads against tree trunks at the equivalent of 16 mph with each blow. The force would be disastrous if these birds hadn’t developed a spongy layer between brain and skull. A membrane closes over the eyes on impact, possibly so the eyeballs won’t literally pop out.
Freaky fact: a pileated woodpecker’s tongue can extend 4 inches beyond its bill, the better to capture ants and other insects with its barbed, mucous-covered length. That’s actually not the freaky part. At rest, the tongue retracts through the throat and curves around the outside of the skull and between the eyes, attaching in the right nostril.
As the jackhammers of the forest, pileated woodpeckers do important construction work for the other creatures. Working in pairs that are thought to mate for life, they start multiple nesting cavities each year, usually in the trunks of dead trees, finishing only one and then abandoning its roomy interior after the young of the year have fledged. Screech owls, bluebirds and starlings—even squirrels, raccoons and bats—consider these prime digs and often move in the next year. Pileated woodpeckers live in the Eastern United States, Canada and parts of the Pacific Coast.
