A walk in Queen’s Wood near Highgate on Sunday afternoon. We hear drumming.
A Woodpecker, a Greater Spotted Woodpecker.
Drumming.
It flies from tree to tree.
It seems to choose different thicknesses of trunk or branch to tune the sound.
“The drumming sound often heard is the Woodpecker trying to attract a mate by vibrating its bill against a branch.”
http://www.naturegrid.org.uk/biodiversity/birds/woodpeck.htm#great
Could the Woodpecker's percussive communication be a rare, or perhaps the only, example of non-human communication using a musical instrument?
