Luck in the woods this past weekend.

I consider this a pretty elusive bird that is difficult to photograph. Lucky enough for me while I was bow hunting in central Wisconsin i had my Rebel XT & 70-200f2.8 IS and managed to snap a few shots of this beautiful woodpecker. We have quite a few of them on our property but they are always on the go, lucky for me this girl didn't see me in my ground blind and landed about 25' from me. I typically go out when it's dark and i had my iso cranked up and usually turn it down as the sun comes up but as i was hunting i had other things on my mind as well. Not the greatest picture but I am happy with the results and these are my best pileated shots to date.
Thanks,

f4
1/400sec
ISO 1600
200mm

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Nice capture, I would love to see one of these huge peckers...We don't have them here!

Nice shot of a Pileated Woodpecker. Your guy is a gal by the way. The females have the black stripe/moustache running from the mouth accross the face like in your photo while the males have a red one that matches their red top.

Nice catch on the Pileated!

Nice catch Matt. I saw one in the woods last week, but too many trees in the way, and he wouldn't let me get close. They are around though.

Thanks for the info on how to identify male vs female, I did not know!

Very nice! I still need to photograph this species so I really envy you.

I'd be proud to have a shot like this... Well done...

I wouldn't mind finding one of these near me. Nice shot.

Great shot. We don't have any woodpeckers at all here in N.Z. !!!.....

Any luck with the bowhunt ??

That is a Good Shot of a Tough to find Bird!!

MtnBreeze: No luck with the bow hunt. Did see a few nice whitetails but nothing within range. This weekend is the whitetail gun hunt so we'll see what happens. I will have my camera with me for that as well. Seems the past few years i've been doing more hunting with my camera than my bow/gun. Either way it's always nice to get out in the woods! Thanks for the feedback all!

Nice shot! Elusive is much too mild a word for these birds. We have a pair in the woods behind us, but they avoid people like the plague. They seem to run from a camera faster than most birds do when they spot a hawk.