Parental care in northern flickers

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Woodpeckers are called keystone species in forest ecosystems because they excavate holes which a wide variety of other species rely on for nesting. This ecological role makes them important targets for conservation and management. I study the behaviour and ecology of woodpeckers in an attempt to understand factors that influence their reproductive success. With my long-term study and colour-banded population of Northern Flickers in British Columbia, I collect data on nest tree use, philopatry, mate choice, and the effects of predators and weather on nest success. One focus of my current research is habitat quality and foraging effort by males and females. I will sample the abundance of ants and other arthropods, the main food of flickers, in relation to habitat edges and different successional stages of grassland. I will follow radio-tagged individuals to see how they trade-off energy demands from their brood with predation risk while foraging. I am also interested in the different parental care roles of males and females, and how each decides how much to invest in offspring. I will sample corticosterone (a stress hormone) in feathers of breeding pairs and relate this to how hard they work when provisioning young and will also radio-track family groups after fledging to see how long parents feed the young, and how the families move on the landscape. Finally, I will fit some individuals with geolocators, new tracking devices which allow me to follow migration movements and see how these relate to parental effort. My research provides insights into how animals decide to invest in offspring, and the consequences this has for their survival and reproductive success. It will help wildlife managers efficiently prioritize the amount and type of habitat needed to ensure stable populations of flickers on the landscape.