Definition of "sapsucker" []

• Any of various small American woodpeckers of the genus Sphyrapicus that drill holes in certain trees to drink the sap and eat insects in them, especially S. varius, the common species in the eastern United States, and S. thyrsoides, found in the mountain regions of the western United States. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "The individual of whom I speak is, properly, the yellow-bellied woodpecker, though he is more commonly known as the sapsucker, in some places the squealing sapsucker; and I hailed with joy his presence in a certain protected bit of woods, a little paradise for birds and bird lovers, where, if anywhere, he could be studied."
• "My oldest daughter who has an amazing memory for all things bugs and birds, informs me that it's actually called a sapsucker ...."
• "Jonathan; but "sapsucker" is, in the opinion of many who have studied his ways, undeserved."