"I saw a black woodpecker (or crow) today about the size of the lark woodpecker," wrote Lewis in the summer of 1805, marking one of his most famous discoveries. Lewis's woodpecker doesn't so much look like a crow (it has a bright red face and a pink chest) as fly like one, with slow flaps. It lives in large dead or burned trees where it can easily excavate or find a hole for a nest. But years of fire suppression have turned the open forests of ponderosa pine favored by Lewis's woodpecker into dense thickets of Douglas fir, and timber companies have removed many of the large trees it prefers.

Partners in Flight priority species in Wyoming.