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Lesser Spotted Woodpeckers in 2019
Male Lesser Spotted Woodpecker feeding young © Julie Redford
Lesser Spotted Woodpecker nest with 6 eggs © Ken and Linda Smith
Lesser Spotted Woodpecker nest with three young, two males and a female © Ken and Linda Smith
Nest inspection camera on extended poles © L Smith
Close-up of nest camera © L Smith
Latest news
April 2024 Lesser Spot nesting update
Thanks to everyone who has been in touch with information about Lesser Spotted Woodpeckers this year. The breeding season has started eary this year with nest excavtions reported so far from the New Forest, Somerset, Devon and Norfolk. At one nest incubation has already started, which is the earliest recorded for the project. Plese keep the information coming in. Please take care not to disturb the birds when making your observations.
Lesser Spotted Woodpeckers: 2023 report
Lesser Spot young (3 male chicks) in a nest Somerset 2023 - photo Gus RobinWoodpecker Network Breeding Season Report
Thanks to the efforts of all our LesserSpotNet collaborators we were able to collect breeding data from 21 Lesser Spotted Woodpecker nests in 2023.
It was a very mixed breeding season but, overall, the number of young fledged was 2.4 young per nest, pretty much in line with the long term average.
The nests monitored in 2023 were from nine counties with most in Hampshire and Somerset. Thanks to a dedicated team in the New Forest, Hampshire continues to be the key county. In Somerset concerted efforts by a small team led by Gus Robin resulted in five nests being found, doubling the county total since 2015. It was great news that a nest was found in Essex at a site with regular records of drumming and calling birds – the first nest monitored in Essex since the project started in 2015.