Common Flameback

The common flameback, or common goldenback, is a small, three-toed woodpecker, 28–30 cm long, found throughout South and Southeast Asia. Males have a bright red crest and females a black crest with white streaks, and both sexes have a white eyebrow, cheek stripe and throat area separated by black stripes, and a spotted black and white underside. It nests in holes in fruit trees, coconut palms or stumps of those, with two or three eggs (Wikipedia, general species account).

It generally lives in lowlands but can reach about 1,700 m in India, where it prefers pine forest. Its loud, high-pitched call, a series of kow-kowp rattles, is very like the greater flameback's and is the best way to tell it from the almost identical Himalayan flameback. Although it is a woodpecker it rarely drums on wood. SoIB 2023 rates it a Low conservation priority, a resident forest bird with a Moderate range and insufficient data on trends (Wikipedia, general species account; SoIB 2023).