Checkered Woodpecker

Checkered Woodpecker

Veniliornis mixtus

Silhouette: Pepe Reigada · PhyloPic

LCLeast ConcernNTVUENCR
Daily sighting probability <5% · Rare
at Chapada dos Guimarães National Park

In 3 days ~10%

13 Verified sightings at Chapada dos Guimarães National Park From 2019 to 2026
313 In all 5 parks
October Best month
☀️ Diurnal When it's spotted

About the Checkered Woodpecker

The checkered woodpecker (Veniliornis mixtus) is a species of bird in subfamily Picinae of the woodpecker family Picidae. It is found in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Paraguay, and Uruguay. The checkered woodpecker was described by the French polymath Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon in 1780 in his Histoire Naturelle des Oiseaux from a specimen collected in Buenos Aires, Argentina. The bird was also illustrated in a hand-colored plate engraved by François-Nicolas Martinet in the Planches Enluminées D'Histoire Naturelle which was produced under the supervision of Edme-Louis Daubenton to accompany Buffon's text. Neither the plate caption nor Buffon's description included a scientific name but in 1783 the Dutch naturalist Pieter Boddaert coined the binomial name Picus mixtus in his catalogue of the Planches Enluminées.

The checkered woodpecker was at one time placed in genus Dyctiopicus, which was merged into Dendrocopos, which in turn was merged into Picoides where it and its sister species the striped woodpecker (V. lignarius) were considered outliers. In 2006, Moore et al. published research on mtDNA COI and Cyt b sequences which suggested that the... Wikipedia →

Sounds

Recording0:04

Argentina · 2024

© Sabrina Andrea Rendon Anaya · XC912311 · CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

Drumming0:13

Argentina · 2022

© Franco Vushurovich · XC748510 · CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

Call0:07

Bolivia · 2022

© Jacob Wijpkema · XC732124 · CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

Global Distribution

Parks Where Found

# Park Country Daily sighting probability
1 El Impenetrable National Park 🇦🇷 Argentina
~40%
2 El Palmar National Park 🇦🇷 Argentina
~10%
3 Iberá National Park 🇦🇷 Argentina
~10%
4 Serra da Canastra National Park 🇧🇷 Brazil
<5%
5 Chapada dos Guimarães National Park 🇧🇷 Brazil
<5%

Cities Where Found

# City Country Daily sighting probability
1 Buenos Aires 🇦🇷 Argentina
~30%
2 Rosario 🇦🇷 Argentina
~20%
3 Cordoba 🇦🇷 Argentina
~10%
4 Asuncion 🇵🇾 Paraguay
<5%
5 Mendoza 🇦🇷 Argentina
<5%

Before you go

What are the chances of seeing a Checkered Woodpecker in Chapada dos Guimarães National Park?

Rare

Under 5% of wildlife watchers report a Checkered Woodpecker sighting in Chapada dos Guimarães National Park on a given day, based on 13 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data from 2019 to 2026. It is the 206th most-seen of the 273 birds we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to about 10%, if each day is a fresh chance.

When is the best time to see a Checkered Woodpecker in Chapada dos Guimarães National Park?

Any time of year

In every month with enough records, under 5% of wildlife watchers report a Checkered Woodpecker in Chapada dos Guimarães National Park on a given day, so our monthly data shows no clear season. February to April have too few records to rate.

What time of day is best to see a Checkered Woodpecker?

Between 10 am and 1 pm

Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most Checkered Woodpecker sightings with a recorded time, and about 9 in 10 of them come between 6 am and 6 pm: it is a daytime animal.

Is Chapada dos Guimarães National Park the best place to see a Checkered Woodpecker?

5th of 5

Of the 5 parks where we can rate Checkered Woodpecker sightings, Chapada dos Guimarães National Park ranks 5th at under 5%. The best odds are in El Impenetrable National Park (Argentina, about 40%), El Palmar National Park (Argentina, about 10%) and Iberá National Park (Argentina, about 10%).

Where does the Checkered Woodpecker sighting chance come from?

GBIF citizen-science records

It is estimated from how often the Checkered Woodpecker is recorded against all the birds logged in Chapada dos Guimarães National Park (13 verified sightings from 2019 to 2026), calibrated against known sighting rates. Figures are rounded to the nearest 10% because citizen-science data supports honest approximations, not decimals, and months with records from fewer than five people show "—". How it works.

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