Happy Valentine's Day! With love from the Canopy Lodge comes the image at left of the female Stripe-cheeked Woodpecker found at Altos del Maria on Feb. 6th, digiscoped by Faustino (Tino) Sanchez, also observed by John Rowlett and his Field Guides Inc. tour group. The photo absolutely confirms the identification of this out-of-range species; the red on the back of the crown only, the white cheek stripe, and the dusky throat identify this bird as a female Stripe-cheeked Woodpecker, and eliminate such equally-rare possibilities as Golden-green and Golden-olive Woodpeckers. This is a top-notch find, and further discussion regarding this bird will be presented on this page at such time as Mr. Rowlett and his charges return from their excursion to the remote Darién.
There is an old specimen record of this species allegedly collected in "Veragua," but it comes from a collector whose documentation was so shoddy as to render his work virtually useless. The type specimen was collected in the 19th century from the Atlantic side of what is now the Canal area by more respected collectors, although it should be noted they misidentified the gender of the bird. The foothills of the Darién do sort of trickle down into the eastern Canal area, but, considering that in 150 years Stripe-cheeked Woodpecker has not been recorded even once from an area so thoroughly studied as Pipeline Road, I would call into to question the accuracy of the locality associated with the type specimen.
By the by, on February 12th Danilo Rodríguez and Tony Nunnery's VENT tour group relocated the Rufous-vented Ground-Cuckoo discovered the day before by Domi Alveo on La Zamia Trail. This site could turn out to be this dry season's cuckoo hotspot!
