Suet is the number one food preferred by Downy Woodpeckers at my feeders. They love suet with peanuts or other nuts mixed in, but I learned something interesting recently. If you feed pure suet cakes (no nuts or seeds in it—which I found at Wild Birds Unlimited) the woodpeckers are still attracted to it but starlings show no interest.
Downy Woodpeckers also love peanut halves. I provide those in an open tube-type feeder.
These birds will also eat sunflower seeds, millet and safflower, and they will land on hopper and platform feeders to grab seeds. Downy Woodpeckers are also the only woodpecker that I’ve ever seen drink from my heated birdbath in the winter.
