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Do woodpeckers get Headaches?
Do woodpeckers have brain damage?
What if Woodpeckers had shock-absorbing skulls?
Do woodpeckers have hyoid bones?
Jan 23, 2012 · Woodpeckers’ heads are kind of like bike shocks for their brains. The bones in a woodpecker’s skull keep its brain comfortable and avoids concussions. Woodpeckers' hyoid bones act like seatbelts for their brains. To the left is a woodpecker skull, and on the right are the hyoid bones from a woodpecker and a hoopoe.
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- Little Drummer Bird
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The birds have some clever adaptations to keep their noggins safe.
During election season, everyone can relate to woodpeckers: We all feel like banging our heads against the wall.
It's a tough one to answer, says Walter Koenig, an ornithologist at Cornell University, via email. But, he says, if pecking caused pain and injury, “presumably they wouldn’t be around for very long"—a hurt bird would likely succumb to predators.
There are more than 300 species of woodpeckers worldwide, and they peck wood for a variety of reasons: to excavate nest cavities, dig for insects or sap, or create holes to store food.
When selecting wood, the birds usually target trees weakened by fungal decay, which are easier to crack, Jerome Jackson, a behavioral ecologist at Florida Gulf Coast University, says via email.
The tapping is also “usually done with glancing blows—not a direct hit—thus not so hard on the woodpecker," he says. (See "Weasel Rides Woodpecker in Viral Photo—But Is It Real?")
Some woodpeckers practice drumming (watch video)—a superfast pecking that attracts mates and defends territory—on a resonant surface, like a hollow tree. That allows for a louder noise while avoiding punishing impact.
Acorn woodpeckers of North and Central America have another strategy: They carve out individual holes into trees, each just big enough to "squeeze in a single acorn"—storage for leaner times, Jackson says.
Woodpeckers also have, well, a head for pecking.
For one, woodpeckers have tiny brains—just 0.07 ounce. The bigger the brain, the higher the mass and thus the higher the risk of brain injury, says Lorna Gibson, a professor of materials science and engineering at MIT who has studied woodpecker brains.
“Size is the most important thing,” says Gibson, an avid bird-watcher who documented her results in a video series.
Another factor that protects woodpecker noggins is the limited time the tree and their bill are in contact, she says. It's brief—just one-half to one millisecond. By comparison, a typical human head injury happens between about three and 15 milliseconds.
The outside of a woodpecker's skull is made of dense bone, while the inside is porous bone, Gibson says.
The force applied during pecking is "distributed around the skull to the sturdy bone at the base and the back,” keeping the pressure off the brain, says Richard Prum, evolutionary ornithologist at Yale University, via email. (Related: "Woodpeckers Are Pros at Protecting Their Brains.")
Woodpecker brains also fit snugly in those skulls, preventing the organ from banging around. The orientation of the brain is also important, MIT's Gibson says: It sits at an angle toward the back of its head, like a half orange with the flat side facing the front. That creates more surface area to absorb those exacting blows.
A 2011 study suggested that the hyoid apparatus, a bone-and-muscle structure that wraps around a woodpecker's skull, also keeps the brain safe.
“The bottom line," Prum says, "is good evolutionary design.”
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Jul 16, 2010 · Woodpeckers hit their heads up to 20 times a second. But muscles, bones and an extra eyelid protect their small bird brains.
- Corey Binns
Jul 14, 2022 · Why woodpeckers actually don’t need shock-absorbing skulls to headbang. These birds have incredible hammering power but don't seem to get concussions or migraines. How? By Kate Baggaley....
Jan 8, 2007 · Pileated woodpeckers, the largest woodpeckers in North America, hammer their heads into trees with a force of 15 mph, 20 times a second. So how do their heads not turn to mush?
- Corey Binns
Jul 31, 2017 · Have you ever wondered why woodpeckers don’t get headaches? It is quite remarkable when you think about it. This bird, on a regular basis, subjects its brain to 1000 g of deceleration every time it pecks (g represents the acceleration due to gravity acting on all bodies on the surface of the Earth), and it does so in bursts of 10 – 20 pecks ...
Mar 30, 2023 · A small brain might be key. It's long been thought that the woodpecker's skull acts like a sports helmet to absorb shock. But a recent study, which analyzed high-speed videos of woodpeckers...
