Flickers can be attracted by placing peanut hearts or sunflower seeds on a platform, the ground, or a large hopper feeder. They prefer to forage on the ground, which is why ground feeders are best. When insects are scarce, flickers can survive on any type of suet.

Males call, drum, and display a variety of aggressive behaviors to protect their nesting areas, such as swinging their heads back and forth, flapping their wings, and spreading their tails to reveal their brightly colored undersides. Most courtship behaviors are comparable. A hole in a tree or a post serves as the nesting location, rarely a burrow in the ground. Tree cavities are typically found in dead wood; some popular trees include pine, cottonwood, and willow.

photo credit: Lenny Frieling

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