A photo of a weasel riding a woodpecker

This photo of a weasel riding on the back of a woodpecker. It was an unusual sight.

Something amazing happened: the woodpecker took flight with the weasel clinging onto its back.

Unlike many other woodpeckers, [green woodpeckers] spend a lot of time feeding on the ground on ants around ants’ nests… The weasel will hang around and wait for an opportunity to eat sort of anything that they can.

“I’ve never seen anything like it,” says Dr Stuart Marsden, reader in Conservation Ecology at Manchester Metropolitan University in the UK, who has studied green woodpeckers extensively.

Weasels are ferocious predators that usually predate mammals – they can take on animals bigger than themselves and often eat rabbits. But it’s more unusual for them to attack birds.

“I wouldn’t think that woodpeckers are often taken,” says Dr Marsden. But woodpeckers are ground birds. Weasels go after their eggs and babies, and sometimes adults that are trying to defend the nest.

He thinks the woodpecker was probably feeding in the grass when it was ambushed. The birds’ diet is mainly ants.

 “The weasel will hang around and wait for an opportunity to eat sort of anything that they can eat.

 “Unfortunately it’s gripped on here and it’s been taken for a ride.”

 “They are incredible predators, so I don’t think it’s that remarkable that one tried to take a woodpecker.

Weasel vs. woodpecker

Green woodpeckers grow to around 32cm (12.5in) in length while male weasels measure around 20-22cm (7.9-8.6in) and females reach 15-18cm (5.9-7in)

In weight, green woodpeckers vary from 180 to 220g (5.6-7.8oz), while adult weasels usually weigh between 106-131g (3.7-4.6oz) for males and 55-69g (1.9-2.4oz) for females.

Source: BBC

N.H.Khider