Sphyrapicus ruber
Silhouette: Nancy Wyman (photo), John E. McCormack, Michael G. Harvey, Brant C. Faircloth, Nicholas G. Crawford, Travis C. Glenn, Robb T. Brumfield & T. Michael Keesey · PhyloPic
In 3 days ~20% in a week ~40%
The red-breasted sapsucker (Sphyrapicus ruber) is a medium-sized woodpecker of the forests of the west coast of North America. The red-breasted sapsucker was formally described in 1788 by German naturalist Johann Friedrich Gmelin in his revised and expanded edition of Carl Linnaeus's Systema Naturae. He placed it with the woodpeckers in the genus Picus and coined the binomial name Picus ruber. The specific epithet is Latin meaning "red". Gmelin based his description on the "red-breasted woodpecker" that had been described in 1782 by the English ornithologist John Latham in his A General Synopsis of Birds. Latham mistakenly believed that his specimen had come from Cayenne in French Guiana. The type locality has been designated as Nootka Sound in the Canadian province of British Columbia. The red-breasted sapsucker is now one of four species placed in the genus Sphyrapicus that was introduced in 1858 by the American naturalist Spencer Baird.
The red-breasted sapsucker, the red-naped sapsucker (Sphyrapicus nuchalis), and the yellow-bellied sapsucker (Sphyrapicus varius) were formerly treated as a single species, the yellow-bellied sapsucker. The red-breasted and red-naped... Wikipedia →
| # | Park | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Yosemite National Park | 🇺🇸 United States | |
| 2 | Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks | 🇺🇸 United States | |
| 3 | Great Bear Rainforest | 🇨🇦 Canada | |
| 4 | Olympic National Park | 🇺🇸 United States | |
| 5 | Redwood National Park | 🇺🇸 United States | |
| 6 | Pacific Rim National Park Reserve | 🇨🇦 Canada | |
| 7 | Death Valley National Park | 🇺🇸 United States | |
| 8 | Joshua Tree National Park | 🇺🇸 United States | |
| 9 | Channel Islands National Park | 🇺🇸 United States |
| # | City | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Portland | 🇺🇸 United States | |
| 2 | Sacramento | 🇺🇸 United States | |
| 3 | Seattle | 🇺🇸 United States | |
| 4 | Vancouver | 🇨🇦 Canada | |
| 5 | San Francisco | 🇺🇸 United States | |
| 6 | Los Angeles | 🇺🇸 United States | |
| 7 | San Diego | 🇺🇸 United States | |
| 8 | Phoenix | 🇺🇸 United States |
With luck
About 10% of wildlife watchers report a Red-breasted Sapsucker sighting in Olympic National Park on a given day, based on 378 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data from 2019 to 2026. It is the 78th most-seen of the 216 birds we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to about 20%, and over a week to about 40%, if each day is a fresh chance.
March–June and September–January
In those months about 10% of wildlife watchers report a Red-breasted Sapsucker in Olympic National Park on a given day, against under 5% in February and July–August, the lowest months.
Between 9 am and noon
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most Red-breasted Sapsucker sightings with a recorded time, and nearly all of them come between 6 am and 6 pm: it is a daytime animal.
4th of 9
Of the 9 parks where we can rate Red-breasted Sapsucker sightings, Olympic National Park ranks 4th at about 10%. The best odds are in Yosemite National Park (United States, about 20%), Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks (United States, about 10%) and Great Bear Rainforest (Canada, about 10%).
Same family: Picidae
The closest relatives of the Red-breasted Sapsucker that you can see in Olympic National Park (family Picidae, Woodpeckers) are Northern Flicker (about 30%), Hairy Woodpecker (about 20%) and Downy Woodpecker (about 10%), with each one's daily chance of a sighting.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the Red-breasted Sapsucker is recorded against all the birds logged in Olympic National Park (378 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.
