Chrysocolaptes festivus
Silhouette: Pepe Reigada · PhyloPic
In 3 days ~10% in a week ~30%
The white-naped woodpecker (Chrysocolaptes festivus) is woodpecker which is a widespread but a scarce breeder in the Indian subcontinent. It is associated with open forest and scrub with some trees. It nests in a tree hole, laying one or two white eggs.
The white-naped 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 Goa, on the southwest coast of India. The bird was also illustrated in a hand-coloured 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 festivus in his catalogue of the Planches Enluminées. The white-naped woodpecker is now placed in the genus Chrysocolaptes that was introduced by the English zoologist Edward Blyth in 1843. The genus name combines the Ancient Greek khrusos meaning "gold" and kolaptēs meaning "chiseller". The specific epithet festivus is... Wikipedia →
| # | Park | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Kanha National Park | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 2 | Bandhavgarh National Park | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 3 | Ranthambore National Park | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 4 | Mudumalai National Park | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 5 | Royal Bardia National Park | 🇳🇵 Nepal | |
| 6 | Satpura National Park | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 7 | Wilpattu National Park | 🇱🇰 Sri Lanka | |
| 8 | Bandipur National Park | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 9 | Nagarhole National Park | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 10 | Jim Corbett National Park | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 11 | Yala National Park | 🇱🇰 Sri Lanka |
Rare
Under 5% of wildlife watchers report a White-naped Woodpecker sighting in Wilpattu National Park on a given day, based on 19 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data from 2019 to 2026. It is the 141st most-seen of the 169 birds we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to about 10%, and over a week to about 30%, if each day is a fresh chance.
January, June and October–November
In those months about 10% of wildlife watchers report a White-naped Woodpecker in Wilpattu National Park on a given day, against under 5% in February–May, July–September and December, the lowest months. Those are among Wilpattu National Park's wettest months, with about 170 mm of rain a month against 40 mm in February.
Between 4 and 7 am
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most White-naped Woodpecker sightings with a recorded time, and about 6 in 10 of them come between 6 am and 6 pm: it is most active around dawn and dusk.
7th of 11
Of the 11 parks where we can rate White-naped Woodpecker sightings, Wilpattu National Park ranks 7th at under 5%. The best odds are in Kanha National Park (India, about 30%), Bandhavgarh National Park (India, about 20%) and Ranthambore National Park (India, about 10%).
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the White-naped Woodpecker is recorded against all the birds logged in Wilpattu National Park (19 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.
