Jack London State Park and the hunt for the pileated woodpecker

I read online that there might be pileated woodpeckers at Jack London State Park. A woodpecker the size of a crow: it should be easy to find, right? I imagined I'd see it in the parking lot, stomping on tiny sparrows like an avian Godzilla. Hey, they're related to dinosaurs, right?

Anyway, it turns out that although I did see a dark blob in the distance that MIGHT have been a pileated, that was the best view I ever got. On the other hand, I did see a coyote chasing a rabbit through a grape field.

Also some scrub jays:

And plenty of nature's comedians, the acorn woodpeckers. People say that hyenas and kookaburras sound like they are laughing... I say the laughing animal of California is the acorn woodpecker.

Probably, they're laughing at squirrels who can't pry out their acorns and steal them. That's because acorn woodpeckers use their pecking powers to make holes in dead trees to wedge food for the winter. Just TRY to pull that out, squirrel...

What was interesting about this particular population of acorn woodpeckers is that they had made several of their granary trees out of eucalyptus. Normally they use oak trees, but in this area that has a lot of vinyard and few oaks, the eucalyptic remnants of a failed timber speculation apparently make a pretty good substitute.