A repetitive drumming shattered our early evening suburban stillness. I dashed outside to see a small woodpecker pounding the roof mounted aluminum vent cap protecting the outlet for my neighbour's exhaust fan. Outside, the noise was remarkable. Inside of Dale's house, it must have sounded like canons.

Dying from laughter, I watched as Dale emerged and hurled small stones towards this woodland invader, all the while muttering, "On the farm, we'd shoot the little beggar".

His aim was true and the varmint disappeared...for now.

A few days later we heard it. "Rata-tata-rata-tata-rata-tata-rat".

It was working the wooden siding covering our house. No bigger than my wife's fist, with a streak of red behind its ear and a jaunty head comb, it was a cute, pretty little thing. A Northern Flicker, based upon photos in our bird book.

And then I inspected the house. This wasn't the first time he'd come to see us. Most of the knots in our cedar siding bore evidence of previous visits. The knot he was working on had become a hole, and he had started on the insulation behind the wood.

I scared him away. He went easily enough, but the moment I'm in the house, he came back.

I phoned the local bird sanctuary to see what could be done.

Susie Sparrow at the sanctuary informed in ever so sweet a voice that there's not really much that can be done. I can try frightening him away with streamers or wind chimes or plastic snakes or whatever, but it's really just a transitory thing. He's not really trying to demolish my house, he's just drumming to attract a mate. Once that's accomplished, he and his new mate will nestle down somewhere and leave us alone. If not, Susie tells me, as a last resort I might try wrapping my house in chicken wire. ("And wouldn't that be attractive?", I silently pondered.)

We went the less dramatic route and tried to frighten him away. Whirleygigs and wind chimes and streamers and reptiles were placed at strategic intervals around the perimeter of the house. It looked like we were ready to host a carnival. It was not at all effective as a deterrent and my wife wondered if all the flash served only to remind Woody that ours was the domicile where he could get the nicest reverberations for his courting ritual.

True to Susie's speculation, his industrious hammering on my homestead lasted for only a couple of weeks in early spring and then he was gone; presumably successfully mated.

Later that summer, in an obscure corner of my peck-riddled siding, the largest of the holes became home to an impressive wasp colony. I was forced to use an aerosol propped Bug Blaster to rid myself of this latest legacy from my feathered friend.

"Whacka-whacka-whacka-whacka-whacka-whacka-whack".

Next spring it sounded like a jackhammer going off beside my pillowed ear. I stumbled outside, dressed only in my jockey shorts and favorite nighttime tee shirt, to catch a fleeting glimpse of the two ugliest birds I've ever seen. The size of pigeons they were. Slope shouldered, fat bottomed, with dirty white feathers and a faint black mottle; long black beaks like stilettos. I went on-line and discovered, owing to their size and the length of their beaks, that these were Hairy Woodpeckers; a species revered by tree huggers for their ability to rid our forests from large quantities of burrowing insects. Not to worry if they attack your house, they're not after insects in your siding, "they're just drumming to attract a mate". (And yet a pair of them attacked my house). Like all woodpeckers, they're a protected species, so great is the boreal service they provide.

Fully clothed now, I went back outside to assess the damage. They had hammered several sizeable holes into my siding. The largest had the circumference of a medium orange. The hole went through the wooden siding, through a half-inch layer of pressboard, through four inches of fiberglass insulation. The plastic vapour barrier on the backside of my drywall bore peck marks. Evidence that had I not stopped them, the pair would soon have been in the house. They are a skittish bird. My shorts-clad morning apparition seemed to frighten them off but for a few days we heard them pounding away in other corners of the neighborhood. One day, my wife heard two loud mid afternoon explosions. (Shotgun blasts, I hope.)

Since then, we've neither seen nor heard evidence that these beaked behemoths are lurking about.

Now it was time for me to repair the damage left in their wake. I considered replacing my siding, perhaps going stucco or aluminum. But it's too expensive. At Walmart one day, I stumbled across some cans of expanding polyurethane foam insulation. My father in law had once used a similar substance to seal off the drafts in his garage. I bought a can. Back home, I squirted a bit into the largest orifice left behind by the winged marauders. Nothing happened, so I squirted some more. Still nothing happened, so I depressed the lever and squirted until I got returns to surface. Then I proceeded around the house, filling the remaining holes with pale yellow junk.

Next morning, I surveyed my handiwork. The large hole was still oozing drips of unset foam that trickled down the house and expanded until they eventually hardened into oblong blobs, like so many alien eggs. The expansion process popped one of the siding boards away from the house, leaving a yard-long half-inch wide vertical fissure that had to be repaired.

Courtesy of these industrious aviators, my outdoor summer activities now included the necessity to repair and re-stain the house. Weeks later, fait finally accompli, wife and I were pleased with the newly colored look.

"Pecka-pecka-pecka-pecka-pecka-pecka-peck".

We heard the unmistakable, though greatly muted repetitious blows outside. Closer inspection revealed that yet another pair of woodland wanderers had chosen our domicile on which to practice their musical art. These were just small birds, more like hummingbirds than woodpeckers. (Hummingpeckers, I called them, and unlike their larger brethren they constantly emitted an annoying low-pitched warble.) They decided that they liked the expanding foam insulation in the former home of the wasps. This pair was fearless. I could nearly snatch them off the siding before they took flight. Any rocks or dirt lumps or pinecones thrown in their direction served to deter them for only the briefest of moments.

The foam is soft; they were making short work of getting through it.

By the time I hatched a plan to dissuade them, they were inside the wall, where they seemed intent to set up a late season nest. Pounding on the outside wall, I made sure that they were both airborne, and then I placed a small stone in their entrance to my house. Cleverly, I affixed the stone in place with my glue gun. Then I stood back to watch. My uninvited guests returned. At first aggressively, and then in more subdued fashion, they tried to peck the stone away. Breaking bird beaks, Batman! They quickly abandoned their attempts at this location. But in the morning, I saw where they'd discovered other foam filled spots on my newly stained exterior. Wherever they'd started, I'd plant another stone until eventually they took the hint that they were not welcome.

So now I've got a few stones stuck to my house. Whirleygigs are removed and stored; wind chimes are back in their usual venues; streamers have been shredded by the elements; worthless plastic reptiles, sun-bleached and brittle, have been thrown away.

The carnival is over.

Woodpecker time is finished for this year.

I'm watching the fall sale flyers to see if I can get a good deal on chicken wire.