Woodpecker gotta peck wood

by Donna Andrews of the Femmes Fatales.

In August 2002 I moved into my house after years of apartment dwelling. There were many wonderful things about being in a house. A house with a yard. I could grow plants! I could play my music or my TV as loud as I liked, even tap dance around the house while doing it and no one would complain! And I could wash laundry whenever I wanted—because the laundry room in my old apartment shared a wall with a neighbor's bedroom, we weren't supposed to use it between 11 p.m. and 7 a.m. Freedom to run a load of laundry at midnight may not be as exciting as the freedom to enjoy “The 1812 Overture” or “Bohemian Rhapsody” at earsplitting volume, but it's of a lot more practical use—say when your plane leaves in the morning and you suddenly realize you have no clean underwear.

But along with the joys of house dwelling came a few annoyances. One of the main ones being that the minute you move into a house, you have to start doing battle with all the creatures that want to eat you, or eat your house and yard, or move in with you. Ticks and mosquitoes that are out for your blood and don't care if they give you nasty diseases. Deer and rabbits that want to eat your garden. Termites that want to eat your house. Squirrels that want to gnaw their way through the ventilation grates and raise litters in your attic.

And then there are the woodpeckers.

I have woodpeckers. Lots of them. I love seeing them at the feeder, gorging themselves on sunflower seeds. Or happily pecking on the Woodpecker Tree—when a tree at one side of my yard died, my tree guys suggested cutting down all the branches but leaving a twenty-foot stretch of the trunk in place, partly to maintain a visual barrier between me and the neighbors and partly to provide a habitat for wildlife. Great. I thought. The woodpeckers can focus on that.

Maybe they do. But they also spend a great deal of time pecking on my house.

They prefer pecking the sides of the house, which have no windows. I'm not sure whether it's because the sides offer more square feet of wood for their use or because the lack of windows means they're less likely to be startled by my movements inside. Maybe both. All I know is that they prefer the sides. Especially the north side. The side that the head of my bed is right next to. They like the north side, and they like to start at first light.

There are three reasons why woodpeckers peck on wood. The first is for food—they feed on wood-dwelling insects and on tree sap. My pest control company regularly inspects the siding to make sure there aren't any insects burrowing there that could make it interesting to the woodpeckers. The second reason is to create nesting sites. In addition to felling trees, my tree guys also do siding repairs. They're often in the neighborhood doing jobs or scouring for them, so I've given them standing permission to inspect the trees and the siding as often as they like and bring any dead trees or woodpecker damage to my attention.

But the third reason woodpeckers peck is to make noise. The pecking noise establishes their territory and helps them attract mates. I've even heard of cases in which people replaced wood siding with metal, to the great satisfaction of their resident woodpeckers—metal siding makes a much louder noise when you peck it.

Two weeks ago my yard guys came out, and I had them patch the latest batch of holes and hang up some woodpecker deterrents. Long fluttering streamers of “scare tape”--silver holographic reflective ribbon. Disks printed with immense predator eyes. Even two holographic reflecting owl silhouettes with jingling bells on their feet.

I think maybe it's slowed the woodpeckers down. A little.

A week later I came home from a short trip. It was dark when I arrived—not only dark but windy and wickedly cold. I quickly scampered into the house and settled in for the evening. I ate a leisurely dinner listening to my latest audiobook and went to bed early. I turned out the light, turned the electric mattress warmer on to run for an hour or so, just to take the chill off, and was about to set the sleep timer on my audiobook when I heard it.

Noises in the attic.

I could guess what was happening. The woodpeckers had gone to work again in spite of all the deterrent devices. The tapping seemed to be coming from the end of the attic nearest to their favorite blank wall. They'd pecked a another hole in the siding. Something had gotten in. Squirrels? Mice? Birds of some kind? Probably birds, because there was a lot of tapping. Not the sustained rhythmic tapping of a woodpecker, though.

Unless it was a dying woodpecker. What if when the yard guys closed the holes there had still been a bird in there? A woodpecker, probably. A woodpecker that was even now tapping out his last feeble protests against a cruel fate.

Then I noticed that along with all the tapping and scuffling I was hearing something else.

Bells.

Bells?

Yes, the faint sound of jingling bells.

My deterrent efforts against the squirrels and woodpeckers have not included festooning them with bells.

It was the owls. The silver holographic fake owls. Did I mention that they have bells on their feet.

After some intense listening in different parts of the upstairs, I determined that most of the sounds I was hearing came from the owls. The tapping? The high wind knocking the owls against the house. The scuffling? The wind flattening the owls against the house and then scraping them back and forth.

At least I think so. The noises I hear coming from other parts of the attic could be also caused by the wind knocking things onto the roof. It was a wild night.

Of course, the other noises could also have been coming from birds or squirrels that have gotten in somehow. The tapping of the owls could be startling so they rustle around. So I had my pest control guy check out the attic. No signs of infestation. The noises are all from the fake owls.

Maybe next time the tree guys come they could hang the owls a little differently? Maybe from brackets attached to the side of the house, so they'd be far enough away not to tape on the siding.

I'll give it some thought.

I'm not blaming the owls, though. I'm rather fond of owls, real or fake—and not just because I'm working on a book that will be called Owl Be Home for Christmas. None of this is the owls' fault.

I blame the woodpeckers.

Comments

[Mark]

So is that why you haven’t done a woodpecker book yet?

[Aimee Hix]

We had a woodpecker that liked to peck on the iron door on the chimney. Not the aluminum cap but the outside of the fireplace that could be used to sweep out the ashes.

He must have had a very tough beak or he was very dumb because it made a terrifically loud noise.

[LynDee Walker]

We have a woodpecker here every spring who pecks at the siding on our house outside my bedroom window. Really early. He's not my favorite bird ever.

[Cathy M]

My woodpecker puts holes in my palm trees but thankfully, so far, no holes in the house. Of course our house is stucco covered concrete block with a tile roof, so the only wood available is the fascia on the overhang.