An African woodpecker of dry scrub and wooded grassland. The male is marked by a red nape and a white eyebrow.
The male is 13–16 cm long, with a light-brown forehead, darker crown, red nape, and white supercilium.
It eats insects and fruit, forages alone or in pairs, and also joins mixed-species flocks. Both adults excavate the nest cavity.
An extinction-risk assessment has not been added yet.