Not got a clue about some birds but one just came into my garden that I have never seen before.

probably about the size of a young pigeon with green feathers a sort of greyish fawn colour underbelly. Black face both sides and a red head. Beak I would say maybe longer than a pigeons.

Anyone any ideas

Depends a bit on the size of the garden!

They are sometimes found in large gardens, and will feed on the ground much more than other woodpeckers, often quite far from trees.

If you are having harsh weather that will also drive them to seek food in less usual places.

The call is quite distinctive, quite a loud laughing note, but I doubt if you will hear that this time of the year.

Jock1e - unlikely to be a woodpecker if it was on the ground. They are not usually ground feeders. I have the greater spotted variety as a regular visitor. It pecks away for ages on my peanut feeder. To coin a Tony Hancock phrase (although he was talking about blue tits) - "beaks like pneumatic drills".

QuizMan, sorry but you are wrong as green woodpeckers are ground feeders, we have one or two that regularly visit our garden where they will sit on the ground and dig for 30 minutes or more looking for insects in the grass. They also hop around the crazy paving steps we have digging out bugs from between the cracks. They are completely different from the great spotted woodpeckers which as you say peck merrily away on the peanut feeders. Green woodpeckers are also several times the size of the great spotted woodpecker and as Jock1e has found they are about the size of a wood pigeon.

Take a look at these images

Just for info., my post of 10.43 paraphrased "The Popular Handbook..........., P A D Hollom, Witherby, 1963"

"It feeds much more on the ground than other species ............ and may be met with feeding in the open far from any trees......"