BIRD BIOGRAPHIES 



Most northern flickers migrate. They remain during 

 the winter in some localities, as Cape Cod, where food is 

 sufficiently abundant. Mr. Forbush tells of flickers that 

 have bored holes in summer cottages on the Cape, and 

 spent the winters in rooms which they damaged by their 

 habit of "pecking." He states that bird-boxes contain- 

 ing large entrances placed on the outside of the houses 

 or on the trees near by, would have prevented those flickers 

 from forming the "criminal habit of breaking and enter- 

 ing." ^ Red-Shafted Flickers have also been found guilty 

 of the same crime, and have entered not only dwellings, 

 but school-houses and church steeples.^ 



Though rather shy birds, they often approach inhabited 

 houses and frequently cause amusing situations because 

 of their regular drumming on roof or wall. In Florida, 

 a young -woman whom I know was once aroused from her 

 early morning's sleep by a flicker's knock, and drowsily 

 responded with a "Come in." A friend and I, spending 

 a week-end in an Ohio summer cottage that possessed no 

 alarm-clock, asked to be called in time for a very early 

 boat. We heard a knocking, arose, dressed quietly to 

 avoid disturbing the household, and then found that our 

 summons had come from flickers on the roof, and that 

 we had lost about two hours of precious morning's sleep. 



Flickers have more local names than almost any other 

 bird. Over one hundred names have been recorded, of 

 which "Yellowhammer," and "Golden-winged Wood- 

 pecker," are perhaps most common. 



* From "Useful Birds and Their Protection," by E. H. Forbush, pages 

 261 and 262. 



s Farmers' Bulletin 513, U. S. Department of Agriculture, Biological 

 Survey, H. W. Henshaw. 



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