Food Source for Birds

• White pines provide high-quality food and shelter for woodpeckers and other birds.Stockbyte/Stockbyte/Getty Images
  
  Of all coniferous trees in Michigan, white pines produce the longest cones, measuring up to 8 inches in length. Red crossbills in the region adapted a specialized bill structure to pry apart these cones to obtain seeds, which also feed pine warblers, pine siskins and white-winged crossbills. Brown creepers and nuthatches favor foraging for insects in older white pine bark that is loose enough for their thin bills to penetrate. The loosened bark also attracts three-toed woodpeckers, which flake it off the tree to find food, rather than drilling holes like pileated woopeckers.