A large and long-billed woodpecker with a pale-barred gray-olive belly and a bold facial pattern: the crown is black in the female and black (forecrown) and red (hindcrown) in the male. It forages solitarily or in pairs, preferring dead and decaying trunks where it can excavate for beetle larvae and other insects within savanna and riverine forest. It calls a sharp “kwip-kwip-kwip” and gives a characteristic drum that lasts about 5 seconds, beginning fast and then slowing. The similar Golden-crowned Woodpecker differs by occupying rainforest, having spotted (not barred) underparts, and having a yellow hindcrown patch in the male.