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I studied year-round foraging behavior of 28 color-banded Eurasian Three-toed Woodpeckers (Picoides tridactylus alpinus) from 1995 to 1999 in Berchtesgaden National Park, Germany. My research focused on how foraging time was divided among various substrates and foraging techniques. Foraging behavior was recorded by instantaneous sampling during independent observation sessions (i.e. foraging bouts). A combination of tapping and pecking was the most important foraging technique used during breeding (>43%) and nonbreeding (>59%). Both mean and maximum foraging bouts (mean ± SD) lasted longer during nonbreeding periods (mean: 17.0 ± 3.7 min, maximum: 61.9 ± 30.2 min) than during breeding periods (4.3 ± 3.0 min, 15.5 ± 16.1 min). Sap-sucking was observed rarely during breeding. Males spent less time foraging on branches, whereas females spent less time in the lower third of trees on which they foraged. Males also manipulated foraging substrates more by pecking and digging (probing), whereas females did more climbing and position-changing on foraging trees. I concluded that Eurasian Threetoed Woodpeckers changed their foraging techniques according to seasonal changes in diet and that, during breeding, males used better foraging grounds than females. Le Comportement de Quête Alimentaire chez Picoides tridactylus alpinus en Relation avec le Sexe et la Saison en Allemagne

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We studied year-round food preferences of the three-toed woodpecker (Picoides tridactylus) from 1994 to 2000 in Berchtesgaden National Park, Germany. We color-banded 52 birds for individual recognition, and we radiomarked 25 adults from this sample. We analyzed 142 feces of 30 adults and 588 feces of 40 nestlings from 15 nests. Additionally, we took samples from 20 trees recently used for foraging in 10 woodpecker territories to estimate local prey availability. Based on relative abundance and relative frequency of food items (i.e., importance value), overall diet composition of adult three-toed woodpeckers was dominated by spiders (Araneidea), larvae of longhorn beetles (Coleoptera, Cerambycidae), and bark beetles (Coleoptera, Scolytidae). Adults ate longhorn beetle larvae primarily during nesting, while imagines (fully developed adults) and larvae of various bark beetles appeared to be the main food resource outside the nesting season. Nestling diet was dominated by spiders and longhorn beetle larvae that were gathered 247 ± 122 m (x -± SD) from the nest. Our results demonstrated that consumption of bark beetles by three-toed woodpeckers varies throughout the year, being lowest during the nesting season, while longhorn beetle larvae are preferred throughout the year. Securing habitat requirements of both bark and wood-boring beetle communities is a critical step to maintaining viable three-toed woodpecker populations. JOURNAL OF WILDLIFE MANAGEMENT 68(3):683-693

Evaluating the effectiveness of existing nature reserve systems for the conservation of tropical forests is an urgent task to save the remaining biodiversity. Here, we tested the effectiveness of the reserve system on Hainan Island by conducting a three-way comparison of changes in forest area in locations within the reserves, adjacent to the reserves, and far outside of the reserves. We used a general linear model to control for the effects of covariates (historical forest area, elevation, slope, and distance to nearest roads), which may also be correlated with the changes in forest area, to better explain the effectiveness of the reserve system. From 2000 to 2010, the forest area inside Hainan’s nature reserve system showed an increase while adjacent unprotected areas and the wider, unprotected landscape both experienced deforestation. However, the simple inside-outside comparisons may overestimate the protective effect of the reserve system. Most nature reserves (>60%) showed increasing fragmentation. And the risk of rapid deforestation remained high at low elevations, where remaining forests tend to be easily logged and converted to commercial plantations. Future conservation efforts should pay more attention to those sites with less challenging environmental conditions.

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