Northern (yellow-shafted) Flicker cruising by, and boy did I get lucky! 😄 Interesting, most passerines have 10 primary flight feathers like this Flicker. His shafts can only be seen while in flight, and these are only on his primary, and tail feathers. These feathers are attached to bone and are yellow due to carotenoids they consume in their diet. Most of their diet consists of insects, ants being a favorite, and can be seen frequently foraging on the ground, unlike other Woodpecker species. In winter they will survive on all sorts of berries and even poison ivy. These are the most colorful of all our North American Woodpecker species. In the Western US, the Flickers are red shafted, while in the Central US the red and yellow do breed together, and their offspring can even have orange shafts.