A unique and unusual axe (well for Maine at least!) The Basque Axe!

[halfaxe]

Woodpeckers excavate to get to the insects. They don't kill the tree, at least not directly, it's already doomed.

 

[DarthTaco123]

Yeah, that's what I figured. There were several 2-3" diameter woodpecker holes in the upper half of the tree which helped with it's dying and breaking off, the tree was doomed. Best to take it down and have it serve a purpose than continue to die.

 

[rjdankert]

. . . Best to take it down and have it serve a purpose than continue to die.

On the other hand. . .

"Dead trees provide vital habitat for more than 1,000 species of wildlife nationwide."

Bob

 

[300Six]

Both, the woodpeckers killed essentially the top half or quarter of the tree, it broke off one of these past wind storms.

Sapsuckers (a species of woodpecker) hammer strategic holes in trees in order that oozing sap from the wounds trap insects which the bird then retrieves on a daily basis. Hemlocks and Birches are what they really go for around here. Woodpeckers are not in the business of killing trees in fact they're busy digging out the boring insects and grubs that are killing the tree. However by the time woodpeckers have worked over an Emerald Ash borer-infected Ash tree the dying tree looks like something from no man's land WWI France.