The foothill country of the Sierra Nevada Mountains in California is woodpecker Heaven. The oaks and conifers are the big attraction here. We have been inundated by Acorn woodpeckers since our arrival last fall. They spent weeks pounding on the eaves of our cabin to store their winter food.

Last November I photographed this smaller woodpecker that stood out among all the others in the neighborhood. I misidentified it as a Downy. While viewing a number of photos posted on the Facebook page of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology today, six months later, I remembered my photo and realized that it is actually a Nuttall’s woodpecker. Notice the ladder back. What a great way to spend Earth Day: learning something new about the world around us.