Someone recently asked me what might be digging small holes in their yard. The holes are about the size of a dime and taper down at an angle for about an inch or so with bits of soil scattered around them. I managed to actually see the culprit in action in our yard. They are the work of the northern flicker, or what some of you may have learned as the yellow shafted flicker or perhaps the red shafted flicker, both now considered two subspecies of the northern flicker.