means A bird that drums and hammers its beak into tree trunks to find insects, excavate nests, and announce its territory.

from A plain English compound, exactly what it says on the tin: 'wood' plus 'pecker,' the bird that pecks at wood. 'Wood' goes back to Old English 'wudu,' and 'peck' is a medieval English verb (a likely variant of 'pick'). The straightforward 'woodpecker' name took hold a few centuries ago; earlier English speakers had also called the bird names like 'woodspeck' and the wonderful 'yaffle' for the green woodpecker, an imitation of its laughing call.