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Red-cockaded woodpecker © Eric Blackmore

Meet the Cast

RCWs tend to mate for life in permanent territories, and their young often stay around for a year or two to support the next year’s chicks. Let us introduce you to the ‘hood. View a map

by Judy Althaus

It’s a Wrap

August 1, 2011

Season 4 has come to a close and our RCW stars have done themselves proud. Each of the nine nesting pairs had a successful fledgling this year – except for Arlo and Yvonne, who had two! Check out the updated territory map.

Yep, count ‘em … 10 fledglings survived the season. George and Gracie, who have produced hatchings every single year on or before Cinco de Mayo, lost this year’s first fledgling, Tres. But they rebounded with a second nest and are now watching little Quatro flit from tree to tree.

Things look excellent for next year. Wildlife biologists had set an original goal of 10 breeding pairs of RCWs on the preserve. So, if just one more couple gets together in Season 5, we’ll sigh with relief. And, if some of this year’s juveniles hang around their parents to act as helpers, next year’s chicks may have an even greater survival rate.

Thanks for your interest! You can help support our RCW population with a safe and secure online gift.

Here’s the skinny on the season.

Nesting season count:
32 Eggs
20 Hatchlings
15 Chicks surviving to banding
10 Surviving fledglings

RCWs on site at end of Season 4:
9 Nesting pairs
0 Single adult males
2 Single adult females
2 One-year-old male helpers
5 Male and 5 Female fledglings

It’s good to have extra single males. We hope to translocate a few more this fall – probably the final ones brought in. With a shot at a strong, established partner, single females are less likely to fly away.

Last week we were excited to see one of our females in another RCW population, some 20 miles away! This kind of “long range dispersal” is phenomenal – it shows that our preserve was an important missing link and reinforces our decision to bring back a population. Your support of our RCW “stars” may be a key to the local survival of the species. Thanks again!
 

You’ve Been Knocking; They Keep Rocking

July 1, 2011

Fledglings, fledglings all around!  Perhaps most exciting, Hunter and Heather – a barely-1-year old couple who joined us last fall from Osceola National Forest – have a fledgling named Holly. This is the first successful fledgling for a 1-year-old pair.  No jinxes, but this season is producing lots of “firsts” including Arlo and Yvonne’s newly fledged twin boys, Alfie and Ace.

On a sadder note, Gracie and George’s first fledgling this year, Tres, didn’t survive for long outside the nest.  But the pair quickly re-nested with four more eggs hatching on June 28!  These two are such good parents, we can hope for a Quatro and maybe even a Cinco to fledge yet this year.

Forrest and Brook’s little son Woody is doing great, flitting around, enjoying life and engaging the press.  A total of 9 chicks have fledged so far, including Scarlett and Rhett’s son Jefferson. All but one of the fledglings have survived and they’re still coming!

By late June, we’ve banded 14 chicks and expect to band at least a few more. It’s hotter’n blazes and the summer rains are here.  This is good – RCWs can survive a fairly long period of drought because they eat bugs within trees. But at the end of the day, it’s all about water and the water is pouring down.

You’ve asked how long it takes a fledging to move into its own cavity.  Normally it will live among the trees for 2-8 weeks. Our biologist helps keep a few spare cavities clean and ready for the young ones.  Female fledglings will often disperse first, either in late summer or early spring. An older male with his own glamorous territory will woo the girls until one relocates nearby.

Visit us on August 1 for Season 4’s final report!  So far so good, but please keep on knocking.
 

RCW  “Rock Stars” are Going Gangbusters

June 1, 2011

Our Season 1 bachelor, Forrest – whose nest holds a precious baby boy – is even more thrilled about this monthly report than are Conservancy scientists!  Forrest and Brooke have finally made it work.

Indeed, RCW chicks are popping up like wildflowers! In May we banded 11 little ones and expect a few more to be ready for their ID bracelets soon.  Nine couples have already nested – that’s darned close to the benchmark of 10 needed to sustain the population.  There’s still wiggle room this year, but most of the successful nests are likely well underway.

Arlo and Yvonne, in their first nesting season together, have achieved another first for the new colony. TWO chicks from their nest were banded, are still robust and may fledge soon.  Well-known couples George and Gracie and Rhett and Scarlett, both of whom have one surviving offspring from last year, each have a very strong chick in the nest. Even cast newcomers from last fall are producing hatchlings!

In brief:  We’ve got babies galore.  It’s hot, it’s dry and plenty of bugs are available at the RCW buffet. (Vegetation is lush and very pretty due to some controlled burns the Conservancy did last year.)

Please check in at this site around the first of July, when we’ll hope to tell you about a new crop of fledglings!  And have you seen our RCW slideshow? We’re excited about the spectacular results to date – and we all continue to Knock on Wood. 

A great start to Season IV!

May 1, 2011

For the third year in a row, established performers George and Gracie are in the lead, with four eggs that may have hatched before April’s end! They’re early this year – their Season II chick, Uno, hatched on May 5 and last year’s Dos arrived about the same time. Dos survived the winter and remains in the cluster to help feed new additions to the family.

Four other couples have produced eggs as well, in this order:

• Scarlett and Rhett (who will be assisted by their able fledgling, Beau)
• Forrest and Brooke (Forrest has been squawking about nothing else)
• New partners Desperado and Desiree, and
• Arlo and Yvonne (yes, Yvonne apparently triumphed over Zelda.)

Three other couples have very chippy-looking cavities – a promising sign – including Micanopy and Alachua, who joined our cast from the Osceola National Forest just last fall. The other juveniles are still, well … juveniles.

You’ve asked questions about last year’s fledglings. Two of the four are known to remain, Dos and Beau. This is a typical survival rate for the challenging first year.

You’ve also asked about the musical-nest tendencies of these normally staid homebirdies. Biologists report that bringing in new birds each year creates unusual interruptions, cavity vacancies and a jockeying for position. The cast should settle down once they create a stable population.

So all looks good – the weather’s okay (for birds, the people are already sweating) and bugs are arriving. Our next update is in early June. Meanwhile, let’s all knock on wood!

2011 - We've saved you a seat

Adventure, romance, heartbreak and intrigue continue! For three years, you’ve had a bird’s-eye view of the red-cockaded woodpecker (RCW) through a Conservancy-styled reality series. Together we watched elusive and endangered young birds fight the elements to establish a pioneer colony at the Conservancy-owned Disney Wilderness Preserve.

You were there when 26 juveniles arrived from their North Florida or Georgia birth forests from 2007-09. We all cheered when the first eggs were laid in Nesting Season 1 and gasped at the vulnerability of tiny chicks in Season 2. We shared amazement when four plucky fledglings survived in Season 3.

Last summer, 20 of the original stock remained on site: six breeding pairs, four fledglings and four free-wheeling singles. In a big surprise, they were joined by a female immigrant from the Avon Park program. Eight new sub-adult birds were brought in during October of 2010 to complete this year’s all-star cast.

What threats may they see?

• “Klepto-parasites” such as resident bluebirds, flying squirrels and owls trying to steal their cavities
• Rat snakes slithering into the nests with an appetite for eggs and hatchlings
• Drought and a shortage of dinner-table bugs
• Flooding rains and lightning strikes
• The greatest challenge of all: a fledgling’s leap into the unknown.

The elusive RCW has been forced to the brink of extinction, and was extirpated, or locally extinct, at The Disney Wilderness Preserve for decades. But thanks to 15 years of careful restoration and management of the preserve’s longleaf pine habitat, it appears able to once again support the species.

More than just a fascinating bird, the RCW is a keystone species that provides a service to its ecosystem. A total of 27 other species have been documented using RCW cavities, including lizards, frogs, snakes, squirrels and other birds.

We’ll start peeping for eggs in April. Will this be the year the preserve’s RCWs achieve a sustainable population of 10 breeding pairs? Or will the harsher side of nature prevail? Stay tuned – we’ll offer you monthly updates here!

Nesting Facts

Red-cockaded woodpecker (RCW) season lasts from May through July in Florida. The female selects her mate and they will share a territory, often living in nearby tree cavities for 7 or 8 years or until one dies.

The pair creates a nest high up in the cavity of an old-growth longleaf pine tree. It will be clean and full of wood chips on the inside, and made snake-resistant by rivets of sticky tree sap on the outside. The female then lays a clutch of 2 to 4 eggs, usually one each morning, in the male’s cavity. The two share egg-sitting duty.

RCW eggs hatch after 11 days. When a hatchling emerges, it is featherless, blind and appears almost “raw”. Chicks within a relocation program will be banded when 8 days old, at which time they will weigh an average of 23 grams. Chicks remain in the nest for about 26 days until ready to fledge.

Chicks are fed a variety of insects constantly by both parents. Each wants a fresh bug about every five minutes – all day long. Parents continue to feed their chicks, even after they have fledged, for up to six months. Sometimes a fledgling from the previous year remains in the cluster to help the family.

In times of drought, bugs become harder to find. It’s a typical “brood reduction” survival mechanism for parents to feed only the healthiest chick. More typically, about two-thirds of the hatchlings survive.

RCWs grow to about 7 inches in length with a wingspan of about 15 inches. The bird is named for a small red streak on each side of the black cap of the male only. This is used to determine the sex of a chick after about 12 days. Juvenile males display an obvious red patch; it is noticeable on adult males only when they are angry.

Judy Althaus is a conservation writer in Florida.