Belize Bird of the Week #5 – Golden-fronted Woodpecker, Melanerpes aurifrons

The golden-fronted woodpecker is a fairly common bird in Mexico and Central America that is also sometimes seen in Texas and even Oklahoma. To my eyes, they look very similar to the red-bellied woodpeckers that live in the eastern half of the US (I wrote about red-bellied woodpeckers here). 

Below is a female golden-fronted woodpecker in a cecropia tree.  What long toes she has!

The specifics of its coloring vary depending on geographic location. In Belize and the rest of the Yucatan Peninsula, the nasal tufts, the nape, and the belly are red, whereas in the rest of Mexico and Texas, the nape and nasal tufts are yellow and south of the Yucatan, the nape is orange. 

This one is in a sea grape tree.  You can see a bit of the red nasal tufts in this perspective.

Even though the coloring differs by location, it is considered one species with four forms. I must confess that I am puzzled by the name because I sure don’t see any golden anywhere on these birds unless the name refers to the nasal tufts of the form seen in Texas and Mexico. 

And here is a shot of a female in a papaya tree.  The red on the head of the females doesn't come all the way to the front as it does in the males.

These woodpeckers are big fruit eaters and eat fruit in preference to insects when fruit is available. I observed them eating fruit of the sea grape, papaya, and the Cecropia (trumpet) tree. They seemed to especially like sea grapes and spent hours in the sea grape trees eating the just ripening fruit.  The series of shots below shows the female (turns out that it is only the female that I got good shots of) peeling a strip of sea grape flesh off the still unripe grape.  The sea grape is mostly one large seed with only a thin layer of flesh; the woodpecker really worked hard for such a small prize!

To end this post I have images of a bright orange star fish in the shallow water with the eel grass and a view of Great Monkey Cay (pronounced “key”) just off shore.

Those golden-fronted woodpeckers sure have a good view!