104 BULLETIN : MUSEUM OF COMPARATIVE ZOOLOGY. 



/1 887) this red is confined to the occiput and a narrow border on the side 

 of the crown posterior to the eye, the remainder of the head above being plain 

 black spotted with white. 



Spring birds of both sexes are paler beneath than autumnal specimens, the 

 latter having a decidedly browner cast. None of the females in my large 

 series show any red on the head, but more than fifty per cent of them have the 

 feathers of the forehead streaked with dull white. In one bird (No. 17,205, 

 Santiago, Nov. 24, 1887) this white streaking extends over the entire crown, 

 only the occiput being unmarked. Many specimens of both sexes have the 

 white markings of the wings and tail tinged with brown, evidently a stain. In 

 a few specimens this brownish is also conspicuous on the breast and throat. 



Mr. Frazar considers this Woodpecker " rather conmion and "euerallv dis- 

 triljuted in the Cape Region, except on the mountains, where it was not met 

 with." He found it most numerous about La Paz, but did not see it any- 

 where to the northward of that place during his trip along the Gulf coast. Mr. 

 Belding includes it in his list of " Birds of the Mountains," but says that it 

 was "rarely seen." On the Pacific coast of the Peninsula he traced it to a 

 point thirty miles north of Todos Santos, which, however, by no means marks 

 tlie limit of its distribution in this direction, for Mr. Bryant found it on Santa 

 Margarita Island, and afterwards collected specimens as far north as latitude 

 28°. It has since been reported by Mr. Anthony ^ as " abundant about the 

 cardoon and cirio trees " at San Fernando (lat. 29° 30'), where " young were 

 seen in families of four or five " in June, and where the bird was " not uncom- 

 mon along the coast and lower foothills as far as San Telmo at least, living in 

 the thickets of pitahaya cactus {Cerent gummosus), and nesting in the dry flower 

 stalks of the mescal agave which grows with the cactus. San Fernando and 

 San Telmo skins are indistinguishable from those from Cape St. Lucas." 



Although the St. Lucas Woodpecker is practically confined to the Peninsula 

 it has been recorded from the northern part of San Diego county, CaUfornia, 

 by Mr. G. S. Miller, jr.^ 



Sphyrapicus varius nuchalis Baird. 



Eed-naped Sapsccker. 



Sphi/Tapicus varius nuchalis Beldisg, Proc. U. S. Nat. Mas., VI. 1883, .349 (Laguna). 

 Bktant, Proc. Calif Acad. Sci., 2d ser., II. 1889, 286 (La Laguna). 



A Red-naped Sapsucker " obtained at Laguna," on February 1, 1883, by Mr. 

 Belding, is the only specimen known to have occurred in Lower California. 

 The bird is probably of rare and irregular occurrence here (if, indeed, anything 

 more than a mere waif) for its true home is the Rocky Mountain region and 

 south into northern Mexico. A few specimens have been taken in southern 



1 Auk, XII. 1895, 138. 2 Auk, XI. 1894, 178. 



