Black magic

When I first moved to Brussels over fifteen years ago, my very first walk in the Forêt de Soignes/Zoniënwoud produced a pair of Black Woodpeckers chasing each other around a tree trunk in courtship.  This is going to be great I thought yet, despite hundreds of visits to the forest since then, that sighting has not once been repeated and, more often than not, getting a brief, in-flight view of a Black Woodpecker is about all I can hope for.  Yesterday,  I decided to take a walk around Kalmthout Heath in the hope of catching up with the lingering Great Grey Shrike before it finally leaves, but it was nowhere to be seen.  The heathland was alive with recently-arrived Stonechats, however, and it took me a while to realise it was them making the scratchy song I was hearing since I'd not heard it for the past nine months or so.  Woodlarks were also singing with four showing well as they chased each other in a territorial dispute.  Other than that, the heath was very quiet.  Towards the end of the walk, though, I heard a noise I couldn't place and soon located two Black Woodpeckers chasing each other round a small birch tree.  I presumed it was another courtship display but it turned out to be two males!  They were perched on opposite sides of the trunk, with one bird occasionally poking its head around the tree towards the other, thus prompting some vigorous sky-pointing by both birds, accompanied by low clucking calls.  This was repeated over and over again for the next 15 minutes without either bird moving from the spot, and was presumably some kind of territorial display.  In any case it was wonderful to watch, and made my long, cold walk around the heathland more than worthwhile.