''Picoides'' is a

genus Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms as well as viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus comes above species and below family. In binomial nom ...

woodpeckers Woodpeckers are part of the bird family Picidae, which also includes the piculets, wrynecks, and sapsuckers. Members of this family are found worldwide, except for Australia, New Guinea, New Zealand, Madagascar, and the extreme polar regions. ...

(

family Family (from la, familia) is a group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or affinity (by marriage or other relationship). The purpose of the family is to maintain the well-being of its members and of society. Idea ...

Picidae) that are native to

Eurasia Eurasia (, ) is the largest continental area on Earth, comprising all of Europe and Asia. Primarily in the Northern and Eastern Hemispheres, it spans from the British Isles and the Iberian Peninsula in the west to the Japanese archipelago ...

and North America, commonly known as three-toed woodpeckers.

Taxonomy

The genus ''Picoides'' was introduced by the French naturalist Bernard Germain de Lacépède in 1799. The

type species In zoological nomenclature, a type species (''species typica'') is the species name with which the name of a genus or subgenus is considered to be permanently taxonomically associated, i.e., the species that contains the biological type specime ...

was subsequently designated as the

Eurasian three-toed woodpecker The Eurasian three-toed woodpecker (''Picoides tridactylus'') is a medium-sized woodpecker that is found from northern Europe across northern Asia to Japan. Taxonomy The Eurasian three-toed woodpecker was formally described in 1758 by the Swedi ...

(''Picoides tridactylus'') by the English zoologist

George Robert Gray George Robert Gray FRS (8 July 1808 – 6 May 1872) was an English zoologist and author, and head of the ornithological section of the British Museum, now the Natural History Museum, in London for forty-one years. He was the younger brother ...

in 1840. The genus name combines the Latin ''Picus'' for a woodpecker and the

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

''-oidēs'' meaning "resembling". The genus ''Picoides'' formerly contained around 12 species. In 2015 a molecular phylogenetic analysis of nuclear and mitochondrial DNA sequences from pied woodpeckers found that three existing genera (''Picoides'', ''

Veniliornis ''Veniliornis'' is a genus of birds in the woodpecker family Picidae. They are native to Central and South America. Taxonomy The genus was introduced by the French ornithologist Charles Lucien Bonaparte in 1854. The word ''Veniliornis'' combin ...

'' and ''

Dendropicos ''Dendropicos'' is a genus of woodpeckers in the family Picidae. They are small woodpeckers that are native to the sub-Saharan woodlands and forests. Taxonomy The genus ''Dendropicos'' was introduced by the French ornithologist, Alfred Malherbe ...

'') were

polyphyletic A polyphyletic group is an assemblage of organisms or other evolving elements that is of mixed evolutionary origin. The term is often applied to groups that share similar features known as homoplasies, which are explained as a result of conver ...

. After the resurrection of five monophyletic genera and the subsequent rearrangement in which most of the former members of ''Picoides'' were moved to ''

Leuconotopicus ''Leuconotopicus'' is a genus of woodpeckers in the family Picidae native to North and South America. Taxonomy The genus was erected by the French ornithologist Alfred Malherbe in 1845 with Strickland's woodpecker (''Leuconotopicus stricklandi'' ...

'' and ''

Dryobates ''Dryobates'' is a genus of birds in the woodpecker family Picidae. The species are widely distributed and occur in both Eurasia and the Americas. Taxonomy The genus ''Dryobates'' was named by the German naturalist Friedrich Boie in 1826 with t ...

'', only three of the original species remained.

Description

The males of all three species have yellow on the crown, though this feature is also present in some other pied woodpeckers, namely brown-fronted and yellow-crowned. The remaining color pattern of the plumage, structural features, and life habits are very similar to related woodpeckers of the ''

'' and ''

'' genera. The foot of all three species show an extreme adaptation to arboreal living by lacking the first digit, or hallux. It has been pointed out however that various species of pied woodpecker are similar in having a short first digit. Two species of woodpecker in genus '' Sasia'' (not closely related) also lack the first digit.

Habits

As opposed to genus ''Dryobates'', the three species of ''Picoides'' obtain most (some 85%) of their insect prey by pecking live or dead wood. The

hairy woodpecker The hairy woodpecker (''Leuconotopicus villosus'') is a medium-sized woodpecker that is found over a large area of North America. It is approximately in length with a wingspan. With an estimated population in 2020 of almost nine million individ ...

(''Leuconotopicus villosus'') for instance, obtains only 45% of its food by pecking wood, 30% from the surface of trunks and 25% at other places.

Species

The genus contains the following three species:

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q921396 Bird genera Dendropicini