NOTES OX THE BIRDS OF TENNESSEE WETMORE 195 



When at the Paris Museum recently I took occasion to examine 

 this bird and cliecked the discrepancy in head color noted by Pucheran. 

 I went through the old catalog of the bird collection to find that in 

 addition to this bird there had been another in the museum prior to 

 1831, when Lesson named atrotharaa;, an individual cataloged as No, 

 2170, marked as taken at Philadelphia by Lesueur in 1824. This second 

 specimen was located after some search, and was found to be an 

 iinmature individual of the eastern Sphyrapicus varitcs with the 

 crown brown, spotted with red, but without the black crescent on the 

 breast. 



The first specimen, No. 2168, female, from Newfoundland, is a 

 mounted bird in fair condition, though a little faded from exposure 

 to light, and has the following measurements : Wing 122.5, tail 72.8, 

 culmen from base 22.5, tai'sus 21.2 mm. To repeat, this bird has the 

 crown deep black, with three tiny dots of red on the left side of the 

 center, and a prominent black crescent on the breast. The second 

 specimen, No. 2170, an immatiu-e bird with sex not marked, from 

 Philadelphia, is also a mounted bird, complete and in fair condition, 

 except that some of the rectrices are loose. The crown is brown with 

 )nunerous spots of red, and there is no black on the breast. It 

 measures as follows: Wing 123.7, tail 70.8, culmen from base 23.0, 

 tarsus 19.2 mm. 



It appears that Lesson must have drawn his description from these 

 two individuals and that the type material is composite. 



DRYOBATES VILLOSUS VILLOSUS (Linnaeus): Eastern Hairy 



Woodpecker 



The State of Tennessee includes an extensive area of intergradation 

 between the northern and southern forms of the hairy woodpecker, 

 races that differ mainly in smaller size coupled with some restriction 

 of the white markings on the dorsal surface in the southern subspecies. 

 Transition in size from north to south is gradual, without sudden 

 break. Specimens from the vicinity of Reelfoot Lake are definitely 

 intermediate between the two races under consideration (wing in 2 

 males 117 and 119 mm, in 2 females 115 and 115.8 mm), but they seem 

 slightly nearer the northern group. The specimens seen include skins 

 from Reelfoot Lake, April 28 and May 7 ; 3 miles south of Samburg, 

 October 11; 2 miles south of Ridgley, October 15; and 7 miles north- 

 east of Tiptonville, October 22. Their identification as villosus is 

 tentative in view of the fact that the southern race has been recorded 

 from the Mississippi bottoms in southern Indiana and southern Illi- 

 nois. In the Biological Survey collection there is a male with the 

 M'ing much worn, taken at Lexington by A. H. Howell on July 9, 1910, 

 with a measurement of 115.5, that seems also intermediate but is in 

 such a state of plumage that it is difficult to place. 



