Great Spotted woodpecker,  (Dendrocopos major)

About blackbird-sized and striking black-and-white. It has a very distinctive bouncing flight and spends most of its time clinging to tree trunks and branches, often trying to hide on the side away from the observer. Its presence is often announced by its loud call or by its distinctive spring 'drumming' display. The male has a distinctive red patch on the back of the head and young birds have a red crown.

I spotted both birds during a drive around a local reservoir, as they went about their regular journey searching for food for their young. The nesting tree was dead and had recently lost its upper branches leaving a poor stunted remainder of its former self. However this dead tree was obviously very attractive to the woodpecker pair, as it made it easier to drill into its trunk for their nest. The nest itself was only about 10feet (3metres) from the ground and literally 3feet (1 metre) from the road.

Due to its proximity to the road, I was able to use my car as a hide, simply using some netting to cover my shape in the open window.

I tried to take a straight photo metering for the highlights, however as I was looking up at the nest and the sky and hill in the background were much lighter than the birds, the resulting image was very under-exposed. I therefore used a flash attached to the cameras hot-shoe to balance the exposure.

Top image - The male bird, just showing the red patch on the back of its head.

Second image - The female bird returning to the nest with beak full of grubs for the young.

Third image - this is the male parent feeding the youngster. Whilst visiting the nest on this day, I observed the male returning to feed the young twice as many times as the female! I'm certainly not saying this is normal but the male bird certainly showed the effect of all that work, as its plumage was visibly getting worse.

Fourth and Fifth image - these close ups of the chicks after leaving the nest were taken a year after the previous images, at a different nest. I lucky to see both chicks soon after emerging from the nest. They stayed near the nest for a couple of hours only, still being fed by the parents, before disappearing further into the woods. The chicks are good climbers straight away and use their large claws to help them quickly scale the trunk of a tree. Unfortunately they are not so good at climbing down the tree and both dropped out of the nest down to the forest floor before looking for sanctuary up the next tree.