WESTERN BIRDS Sapsuckers 



brush-tongued Woodpeckers have peculiar food habits. 

 Being true sap-sucking and cambium-eating species they 

 girdle and kill many trees, either by destroying extensive 

 areas of the cambium or, more commonly, by removing 

 many small pieces in such a way as to sever most if not 

 all the channels carrying the elaborated sap from which 

 both wood and bark are formed. 



The result of Sapsucker attacks on trees are so uniform 

 and characteristic as to be distinguished easily from the 

 work of other Woodpeckers. Sapsucker holes are drilled 

 clear through the bark and cambium and often into the 

 wood. They vary in outline from circular to squarish 

 elliptical, in the latter case usually having the longer 

 diameter across the limb or trunk. Generally they are 

 arranged in rings or partial rings around the trunk, but 

 they often fall into vertical series. Deeply-cut holes 

 arranged with such regularity are made only by Sap- 

 suckers. 



After the original pattern of holes is completed, the 

 Sapsuckers often continue their work, taking out the 

 bark between holes until sometimes large areas are 

 cleanly removed. This often occurs on small limbs or 

 trunks, where long strips of bark up and down the trees 

 are removed, leaving narrow strings between. This effect 

 is also produced by continually enlarging single punc- 

 tures by excavating at the upper end, which is done to 

 secure fresh inner bark and a constant supply of sap. 

 Occasionally, after a tree has been checkered, or grooved, 

 after the above described systematic methods, it may be 

 barked indiscriminately, leaving only ragged patches of 

 bark. 



Even in such cases, however, traces of the regularly 

 arranged punctures are likely to remain, and there is no 

 difficulty in recognizing the work as that of Sapsuckers, 

 for no other Woodpecker makes anything like it on 

 sound, living trees. 



All holes, grooves, or irregular openings made by Sap- 



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