woodpecker

From wood +‎ pecker. Compare Middle English wod spek (“woodpecker”), Middle English wodehake (“woodpecker”), Middle English wodewale (“woodpecker”). Displaced speight.

• (UK) enPR: wo͝odʹpĕkər, IPA^(key): /ˈwʊdpɛkə/

• Audio (Southern England):

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• (US) enPR: wo͝odʹpĕ'kər, IPA^(key): /ˈwʊdˌpɛkɚ/

• Audio (US):

  (file)

• Hyphenation: wood‧peck‧er

woodpecker (plural woodpeckers)

2. Any bird of species-rich family Picidae, with a strong pointed beak suitable for pecking holes in wood.
   • 1886, Peter Christen Asbj&oslash￵rnsen, translated by H.L. Brækstad, Folk and Fairy Tales, page 89:

     On its summit towered aloft the fir tree which has often been referred to, like a mighty mast, full of woodpeckers' holes.

   • 1922, E[ric] R[ücker] Eddison, The Worm Ouroboros: A Romance, London: Jonathan Cape […], →OCLC, page 19:

     His skin was scarlet like the head of the green woodpecker.

   • 1928 August, Outram Bangs, James L. Peters, “Birds Collected by Dr. Joseph F. Rock in Western Kansu and Eastern Tibet”, in Bulletin of the Museum of Comparative Zoölogy‎^[1], volume LXVIII, number 7, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard College, →OCLC, page 333:

     An adult female of this rare woodpecker was taken at 6,000 feet in April 1925 near Chingchuan in the forests of northern Szechuan.

   • 1984, Virginia Wildlife, volume 45, Virginia Commission of Game and Inland Fisheries:

     Birdwatchers would enjoy a host of sparrows, a herd of swans, a descent of woodpeckers, a herd of wrens, and mutation of thrushes.

3. (military slang) A Type 92 heavy machine gun.

• speight, spight

• picid

• woodpecker on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• Picidae on Wikispecies.Wikispecies
• Category:Picidae on Wikimedia Commons.Wikimedia Commons
• “woodpecker”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.

• peckerwood