Order PICI. 



Family PICID^E. 



DRYOBITES VILLOSrS(L) (393.) 



HAIRY WOODPECKER. 



The Hairy Woodpecker must be accepted as a permanent 

 resident with the qualification that he numerously visits more 

 northern sections in summer. Enough remain to retain per- 

 manent proprietorship for the family, however. Nesting 

 holes are excavated in old. partially decayed trees, at different 

 elevations as availability may determine, and some half a yard 

 in depth, in the bottom of which are deposited four or five 

 clear white, smooth, thin- shelled eggs, with somewhat of a 

 roseate tint. No soft materials underly them except fine chips 

 of rotten wood perhaps. 



The nidification of this species is said to be more observable 

 in the northern counties, but certainly it is by no means com- 

 mon through the southern, or middle counties. Its winter dis- 

 tribution is restricted to the dense forests, notably the pine 

 districts. 



In the latter days of February usually, individuals of this 

 species, often accompanied by a pair of the Downy Woodpeck- 

 ers make their appearance about our outhouses and shrubbery, 

 but they pay only brief visits until somewhat later, when they 

 are seen more frequently, and remain longer when they come. 

 When the genial suns of May have made the world once more 

 all beautiful, they disappear for nidification. Then they must 

 be sought for in the forest principally, although occasionally a 

 pair by some means, ignores specific conventionalities, and 

 builds in the end of a fence rail not a hundred yards from a 

 dwelling, or in a hole in a fruit tree not half that distance 

 away. They have been known to breed on the campus of the 

 State University as early as the 3d of May, but that is nearly 

 two weeks earlier than some enter upon nest building. 



