Pileated woodpeckers

All this week a woodpecker has been pecking at the corrugated siding on an old barn at the end of Wildes Road making  loud tapping sounds that could be heard halfway down the road.     When I got closer to the barn and its noisy tapping, I was able to hear a goose replying with its loud angry quacking.  Then, soon after in the distance, I heard another faint sound of a woodpecker.  These back and forth replies between the two woodpeckers continued on for sometime as I strolled back down the road and probably continued for several hours more.  I don’t know about the goose and why it was important to get his few quacks into the conversation but it finally stopped.  I assume the two woodpeckers were getting more and more acquainted with each call.  Maybe this summer I will see a smaller version of the Pileated woodpeckers flying from one tree trunk to the other with its parent demonstrating how to search for insects.

I sketched the above scene using a find from the local thrift store, an old Waterman fountain pen made in France with an 18 carat nib!  (And only $0.25!)  It quietly slides across the paper as I sketch making  lovely marks on the paper.   After the sketch was completed, I applied a wet paint brush over some of the marks and lines to create darks areas as needed.