PICID.E — THE WOODPECKERS. 559 



place for the purposes of incubation. At Tucson, in Arizona, he found it 

 frequenting the cornfiekls, where it might be seen alighting on the old hedge- 

 posts in search of insects. Its note, he adds, resembles very much that of 

 the Ked-headed Woodpecker. He afterwards met with this bird in Cali- 

 fornia, in considerable numbers, on the Colorado. Besides its ordinary note.s, 

 resemljling those of the Mdancrpcs eri/fhroccpJialns, it varies them witli a soft 

 plaintive cry, as if hurt or wounded. He found their stomachs filled with 

 the white gelatinous Ijerry of a parasitic plant which grows abundantly on 

 the mesquite-trees, and the fruit of which forms the principal food of many 

 species of birds during the fall. 



Dr. Cones gives tliis bird as rare and probably accidental in the immediate 

 vicinity of Fort Wliipple, but as a common bii-d in the valleys of the Gila 

 and of the Lower Colorado, where it has the local name of Suivarrow, or 

 Saguaro, on account of its partiality for the large cactuses, with the juice of 

 which plant its plumage is often found stained. 



Dr. Cooper found this Wood]iecker alnmdant in winter at Fort Mohave, 

 when they feed cliietly on tiie berries of the mistletoe, and are very shy. 

 He rarely saw them pecking at tlie trees, but they seemed to depend for a 

 living on insects, which were numerous on the foliage during the sjiring. 

 They have a loud note of alarm, strikingly .similar to that of the P/iwnopepla 

 nitciis, which associated with them in the mistletoe-boughs. 



About the 25th of March he found them preparing their nests in burrows 

 near the dead tops of trees, none of them, so far as he saw, being accessible. 

 By the last of ]\Iay they had entirely deserted the mistletoe, and were prob- 

 ably feeding their young on insects. 



Genls MELANERPES, Swainson. 



^[elanc■|■pcs, S\v.\ix,soN, F. B. A. II, 1831. ^Type, Picas cnjthroccphalus.) 

 Melampicus (Section 3), M.4LHEI!EE, Mum. Ac. Metz, 1849, 365. 

 Asyndesmus, CouES, Pr. A. N. S. 1866, 5.5. (Type, Picus torqnatus.) 



Gen. Char. Bill about equal to the head ; broader than high at the I^ase, but becom- 

 ing compressed immediately anterior to the commencement of the gonys. Culmen and 

 gonys with a moderately decided angular ridge ; both decidedly curved from the very 

 base. A rather prominent acute ridge commences at the base of the mandible, a little 

 below the ridge of the culmen, and proceed.^ Ijut a short distance anterior to the nostrils 

 (about one third of the way), when it sinks down, and the bill is then smooth. The 

 lateral outlines are gently concave from the basal two thirds ; then gently convex to the 

 tip, which does not exhibit any abrupt bevelling. Nostrils open, broadly oval ; not con- 

 cealed by the feathers, nor entirely basal. Fork of chin less than half lower jaw. The 

 outer pair of toes equal. Wings long, broad ; lengthened. Tail-feathers broad, with 

 lengthened points. 



The species all have the back black, without any spots or streaks anywhere. 



Dr. Cottes places M. torqiudus in a new genus, Asyndesmus. characterized 

 by a peculiar texture of tlio under part and nuchal collar, in whicli the 



