Hi Tweeters,

My husband and I saw the immature yellow-bellied sapsucker today in Fall City. I really couldn't see any difference from an immature red-naped sapsucker, though the call was exactly as in my birding app iBirdPro (a bit longer, 'meow-ier,' and less harsh than the recorded call of the red-naped sapsucker). But I did find this in Nat'l Geo Complete Birds of North America: for red-naped sapsucker, "Closely resembles juvenile Yellow-bellied, but adult-like face pattern is attained by beginning of October (brown may be retained on breast into midwinter.)" The Fall City bird has brown on the breast but the face pattern is certainly not adult-like either in the coloring or the extensiveness of the white.

https://ebird.org/checklist/S78182783

Mary Saylor
Issaquah