The following is from Bent's life history notes from this site. It is about a quarter of the way down the page under Courtship. At the end, the writer claims that there was never any suggestion of combat or intimidation. There are more dance observations in the text following this excerpt.

http://birdzilla.com/omnibus.asp?strType=Bent&strTitle=Northern+Flicker&strURL=northern_flicker.htm

Courtship: The courtship of the flicker is a lively and spectacular performance, noisy, full of action, and often ludicrous, as three or more birds of both sexes indulge in their comical dancing, nodding, bowing, and swaying motions, or chase each other around the trunk or through the branches of a tree. From the time of Audubon to the present day, many observers have noted audi described the curious antics of this star performer. But I prefer to quote first from some extensive notes recently contributed by Francis H. Allen, as follows: "The courtship of the flicker is an elaborate and somewhat puzzling performance. Two birds face each other on the branch of a tree or cling side by side, though at a little distance apart, on the trunk, and spread their tails and jerk their heads about in a sort of weaving motion, frequently uttering a note that is peculiar to this performance, a wick-up or weekup. The head motion is a series of backward jerks with the bill pointing up at an angle of perhaps 600 and the head at the same time swinging from side to side. Sometimes a short, low wuck is uttered from time to time during the performance. These bouts occur not only between male and female, but frequently between two males or two females.

"In April 1934, for more than a week I saw a trio of flickers about my. house. Invariably the two females went through courtship antics together, while the male fed on the ground nearby, apparently completely indifferent to them. One of the females was much more active than the other, which usually kept a stiff pose with head drawn in, only occasionally responding with feeble head-waggings. At no time did the active female use any other display than the head-wagging, and there was never any suggestion of combat or intimidation.

Bob

----- Original Message -----
From: "Dennis Paulson" <dennispaulson at comcast.net>
To: <tweeters at u.washington.edu>
Sent: Thursday, October 27, 2005 12:23 PM
Subject: Re: [Tweeters] flickers in groups


> Tweeters, thanks for all the posts on those flocking flickers. Since I
> wrote, I had 5 come in together to the feeders. They are definitely
> attracted to the yard by the suet feeders; otherwise, they're in the
> ravine behind the house, although they do also come in, often singly,
> and search the ground for ants.
>
> I wonder if the "dance" that Bob Meyer's video shows might not have
> been aggressive posturing, which I see all the time when two birds show
> up at a feeder at the same time. Accompanying sounds are distinctive
> also. In fact, why wasn't it between the two females, rather than for
> an off-screen male? I've seen a lot of birds bob at each other that
> way, with spread tail; quite a display and usually at close range.
>
> One of my more interesting flicker experiences was one day when I was
> throwing peanuts out onto the lawn for the Steller's Jays. A flicker
> landed in the midst of them and immediately began hammering on a
> peanut, eventually demolishing the shell and pecking the nuts apart and
> swallowing them. For all the times flickers and jays are in the yard
> together, I've never seen a repeat of that action.
>
> Another interesting thing that flickers sometimes do is to feed from a
> cage feeder full of shelled sunflower pieces, not usually accessible to
> woodpeckers. The flicker merely inserts its barbed and sticky tongue
> through the mesh and pulls out the pieces and swallows them, like an
> anteater getting termites from a nest.
>
> About "intergrade" flickers: the red nape characteristic of
> Yellow-shafted Flicker has spread pretty much throughout at least
> northwestern populations of Red-shafted Flickers and probably shouldn't
> be considered a sign of intergradation any more. At least it doesn't
> mean that that flicker came from the zone of intergradation between the
> two subspecies. I have seen it a number of times in breeding flickers
> in Washington, far from the range of breeding Yellow-shafted.
>
> Dennis Paulson
> 1724 NE 98 St.
> Seattle, WA 98115
> 206-528-1382
>
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