This systematic survey aimed to acquire knowledge about the foraging behavior of the woodpecker in broad-leaved Korean pine forests, and explore the coexisting features of sympatric woodpecker species, by investigating the foraging habitat and behavior characteristics of three woodpecker species. The species were black woodpeckers (Dryocopus martius), three-toed woodpeckers (Picoides tridactylus), and the great spotted woodpecker (Dendrocopos major) that are distributed in Liangshui nature reserve in the northeastern region of China. The survey was conducted from January 5 to 13, 2016 and 45 east-west direction parallel transects were set in the core area of the reserve, each with a length 1 km and each transect was surveyed two times. Furthermore, 25 and 20 transects were surveyed in the morning and afternoon, respectively. Except for the species and sex of the woodpeckers, 15 variables of the forage habitat and behavioral characteristics were measured, which were forest type, slope position, dominant tree species, crown density, tree density, snag density, forage tree species, height of the forage tree, diameter at breast height of forage tree, forage tree situation, forage height, forage position, drill type, and forage duration per tree. Furthermore, 312 forage quadrats of 20 m×20 m were investigated, which included 73, 97, and 142 quadrats of black, three-toed, and great spotted woodpeckers, respectively. We set 484 same area control quadrats in a grid to collect the available data on the habitat factors. The methods of multivariate regression tree and multinomial logistic regression were used to explore the pattern of the woodpecker's forage niche partitioning. Bailey's method and two-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) method were used to analyze the selectivity of the woodpeckers on special forage habitat factor or differences in their forage behavior. The results showed a clear niche partitioning pattern of the three woodpecker species. The virgin fir and spruce forests distributed in the mountain valley were the most favored forage habitat of the black and three-toed woodpeckers, whereas the great spotted woodpeckers randomly foraged in different forests. Furthermore, the great spotted woodpeckers foraged on different tree species, but the black and three-toed woodpeckers most often foraged on firs. Black and three-toed woodpeckers selected foraging spots in the forests with closer crowns, whereas the great spotted woodpeckers preferred to forage in the forests with higher tree density and lower crown density. The great spotted woodpeckers often foraged on bigger living trees, drilled among crowns, and on branches. The other two species spent more foraging time on trunks, especially, the black woodpeckers, which were often observed foraging on snags and logs. The three-toed woodpeckers stripped bark to get food while the other two species drilled holes into the trunks or branches to find xylophagous insects. Two peaks of forage activity in the morning and afternoon were found in black woodpecker, whereas the other two species foraged throughout the day. The black and three-toed woodpeckers usually spent a longer time ( > 20 min) foraging on the same tree than the great spotted woodpeckers, which often changed forage trees. Under conditions of limited food resources, the habitat and behavior niche portioning facilitated the efficient utilization of resources and coexistence of the three woodpecker species. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report on the foraging behavior portioning of these three species of woodpeckers in winter, and the first report on the foraging behavior of Dryocopus martius.