Woodpecker blamed for dozens of broken car mirrors

Credit: John E Marriott

Credit: John E Marriott

Neighbors thought they were being terrorized by vandals. It turns out it was a bird.

Dozens of car mirrors were broken in the Nob Hill subdivision in Snellville, Georgia, this week.

Last Friday Kevin Morrisey walked out to his Ford Explorer to find glass broken on the ground.

"I saw the glass, said, 'Son of a biscuit, it got hit,'" Morrisey told WSB-TV.

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The concerned homeowners contacted police, and officers even stepped up patrol in the area.

Neighbors thought it must be kids with a BB gun or hammer.

“I’ve been hearing them, running up and down the creek behind my house,” said one neighbor.

But when the culprit was caught in action, neighbors learned it was a woodpecker.

The large pileated woodpecker with its red-crested head was actually attacking his own reflection in the mirrors.

“(I was) thinking the worst, just think some kids playing outside and doing damage. But it made sense, two cars, four mirrors and only one broken, why that one? Yeah, a bird. Absolutely a bird,” neighbor Kevin Morrisey said, speaking about his cars.

To combat the woodpecker attacks on their side mirrors, neighbors have resorted to bagging their mirrors to protect them.

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