Overview
- Downy woodpeckers exhale at the instant of impact, matching up to 13 blows per second with ~40-millisecond mini-inhales.
- The front hip flexor and a front neck muscle drive the strike as tail, abdominal, and skull‑base neck muscles brace to rigidly stabilize the body.
- Forces during pecking reach roughly 20–30 times the birds’ body weight, indicating an extreme yet tightly timed whole‑body program.
- Researchers used intramuscular electrodes and airway pressure/airflow sensors on eight wild birds, synchronized with 250‑fps high‑speed video.
- The peer‑reviewed study, published Nov. 6 in Journal of Experimental Biology by Antonson and colleagues, also shows stronger muscle contractions during hard drilling than during softer tapping.