Woodpecker WESTERN BIRDS 



young lack the red on the head and have less on the 

 under parts, the neck collar also being missing. 



In its habit of eating acorns, as well as storing them; 

 also in its way of catching insects on the wing, flycatcher 

 style, it closely resembles the California Woodpecker. 

 In its fondness for ants it is more like the Flicker. I 

 am somewhat loath to report its fondness for apples, 

 and that this taste has caused many of the tribe to be 

 killed. 



Usually, the birds are found in the high altitudes 

 among the pines of the mountains, but in fall they band 

 into small flocks and come down to the oak regions, and 

 stray into the valleys. 



The winter of 1920, during February, one of these 

 handsome birds was seen for several days in the more 

 open region at the head of a canyon in Pasadena, where 

 it seemed at home on the telephone poles. To the dwell- 

 ers in the valleys these birds are rare enough to make 

 the finding of one of them send a thrill through the 

 bird-lover. 



Dr. Merriam tells us that the fondness of these Lewis 

 Woodpeckers for apples causes them to descend in flocks 

 upon orchards, especially those of the higher foothills, 

 and if left to themselves, they will destroy all the fruit. 

 In Siskiyou County, California, these birds were so 

 abundant and so destructive that during the ripening of 

 the fruit gunners employed to shoot them frequently 

 kill twenty-five in a day. From Oregon comes the report 

 that in one orchard from twenty-five to fifty birds were 

 killed every day for from one to two weeks. Such 

 slaughter seems, indeed, terrible and makes one wonder if 

 some other plan cannot be devised to check these ravages 

 on the apples. Especially since the birds are known to 

 open the apples for the coddling moth worms which they 

 contain, and to eat other insect life. Even if at times 

 some Woodpeckers do harm in orchards we must not for- 



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