Northern "Red-Shafted" Flicker

This morning finds Mike and I at the picture windows peering out into the rain at a small bird hopping about in the weeds. We've identified it as a Northern "Red-Shafted" Flicker, Colaptes auratus.

Peterson's Western Birds says that that the Red-Shafted is common to the area and that it has red to salmon orange tail and wing linings, which cause it to flash red or orange when taking off, which indeed this does.

We're happy to see another species of animal make its home here.

Northern "Red-Shafted" Flicker, Colaptes auratus,
image shamelessly stolen from the internet