Sonoma Mountain Ecology Notes

Celebrating and Caring for the Land

Pileated Tongues

Pileated woodpeckers chisel into the cavities left by wood-burrowing insect larvae, their sticky extra long tongues are tipped with backward facing barbs used to grab and yank out their meals. Attached to unique hyoid bones, these wonder-tongues are retracted and stored all the way around their skull and this structure is thought to help dampen the force of their pecking.

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