Viral video shows the oddly satisfying way acorn woodpeckers store their food for the upcoming year
3 million have watched these clown-faced woodpeckers bedazzle trees in the most bizarre way
These bright-eyed, clown-faced woodpeckers have a nifty way of storing their food, but it may trigger trypophobia (a fear of or aversion to clusters of small holes) in some viewers.
The appropriately-named acorn woodpeckers absolutely love — you guessed it — acorns. This particular family lives in California's Carmel Valley where ancient gnarled oaks have stood for 500 years.
Each family of woodpeckers stakes a claim to half a square kilometre of grassland and oaks, fiercely defending their trees from rivals. That's because every fall, the oaks produce thousands upon thousands of tasty acorns.
As far as acorn woodpeckers are concerned, acorns are as good as gold (after all, they're packed with vitamins and nutrients). To store them for the upcoming year, the acorn woodpeckers drill small holes in the bark of a tree and wedge an acorn inside, "tattooing" the tree with thousands of acorns. And we mean ALL OVER the bark of the ancient oaks.
Watch Woodpeckers: The Hole Story on CBC GEM
