I have several Pileated Woodpeckers that visit my feeders every day (central Indiana). The most I’ve seen flying around in my backyard at one time is 5 (3 males and 2 females). It’s pretty cool when they have babies to watch them train their youngins where the easy food sources are versus out in nature, which I have plenty of trees for them to go hunting insects in.
My home is set up high and then the woods are all in a ravine that edges a creek. I can sit and look out the windows of my family room and sunroom, and see the midsections to the tops of the trees. I’ve had friends that describe this as a view like a treehouse would have.
We have about six different kinds of woodpeckers here all year long, except the yellow bellied sapsucker doesn’t come to the feeders. He stays out in the woods. Still I occasionally get to see him, usually late Spring through the Fall. I guess he winters somewhere else.
Yes, Pileateds are not particularly rare, and one has to assume that these purported sightings of Ivory-billed are just misidentifications by people who WANT to see the extinct one, or don’t even know the common one exists.