The Hoot Pecker: Fighting for Survival

The Hoot Pecker is an avian species that's a mixture between an owl and a woodpecker. Once found throughout the entire United States, the Hoot Pecker is only found in the state of Michigan due to urbanization and hunting. The Hoot Pecker, like the woodpecker, are known to eat insects and uses their pointed beak to drill into tree bark for their prey. Only being twelve inches tall, the Hoot Pecker is small enough to evade capture from larger predators such as eagles, hawks, and even owls. The Hoot Pecker emits a owl-like hooting to attracting mates, scaring off most terrestrial/avian predators, and for communication amongst others of its own kind. Though they do have talons, which they do use to hunt large insects such as grasshoppers or mice, are only for fighting off predators or rivals. The Hoot Pecker only sleeps thirty minutes each day due to its busy lifestyle in which they patrol local Michigan forests for insects and other pests. This is why humans like having Hoot Peckers around for getting rid of annoying pests. Different programs were created to help the Hoot Pecker gain a comeback throughout the United States.

Hoot Peckers are in a constant struggle with competition with woodpeckers for the same food source (shown above) and man-made construction. Though thankfully preserves and programs were created in different states including Michigan for the creature's comeback but, it is still unsure if the Hoot Pecker would return to its original roots of becoming common throughout the United States.