340 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



taken to gathering a portion of tlieir food on the ground appear to 

 have adopted the more inconspicuons browns and greens for protec- 

 tion. The common golden-winged woodpecker is a case in point, 

 a bird wliich I fancy occupies much the same place in this country 

 that the green woodpecker does in England, though the latter is 

 probably nowhere as abundant or familiar as our species. Both are 



Golden-winged Woodpeckek. 



genuine enough woodpeckers, but without the conservative habits 

 of the majority of their race. The typical woodpecker, large or 

 small, spends the greater part of its time clinging to the bark of a 

 tree, by preference a dead one, hitching himself along by short 

 stages, usually ascending the tree by a spiral course in order to survey 

 as much of its surface as possible, and whenever he suspects the pres- 

 ence of an insect beneath the bark his sharp bill enables him to dig 

 through bark, sapwood, and everything, until his victim is finally 

 cornered at the extremity of its hole, and is drawn forth impaled on 

 the barbed point of the bird's tongue, or held fast by the sticky sub- 

 stance which covers it. And while so engaged the bird's black-and- 

 white plumage is really not so conspicuous as might be expected, at 

 a distance the colors appearing to blend in such a manner as to give 

 the effect of dark gray or ash color, which matches admirably with 

 the surface of the majority of tree trunks, especially in the shadow. 

 But the flicker gets a comparatively small portion of its food in this 

 manner. Sometimes, it is true, he may be seen pecking away busily 

 enough on a prostrate log or decaying stump in the pastures, and he 

 is said to render valuable assistance to the fruit growers by digging 

 out the borers from the trunks of peach and plum trees at every 

 opportunity, but he prefers the less laborious process of gathering 

 his insect food from the surface of the ground like other birds, 

 probably digging some of it from the turf with his bill. It is said 



