LAND BIRDS. 365 



nuts, but hunting insect larvse in decayed wood in the same manner as other 

 woodpeckers. 



The food in summer is very varied and is about equally divided between an- 

 imal and vegetable substances. One hundred and one stomachs examined 

 at the Department of Agriculture, and reported on by Professor Beal, give 

 the following results: Animal food 50 percent, vegetable food 47 percent, 

 sand and gravel 3 percent. All but 1 percent of the animal food consisted 

 of insects, the remaining 1 percent being made up of spiders and myriapods. 

 The insect food included the following items: Ants 11 percent, 

 beetles 31 percent, grasshoppers 5 per cent, caterpillars 1 percent, plant 

 lice 1 percent. Unfortunately a very large part of the beetles eaten (24 

 percent) consisted of the predaceous families Carabidae and Cicindelida 

 (the ground beetles and tiger beetles), which are mainly beneficial. The 

 ants are of doubtful utility, so that practically the main good done in the 

 consumption of insects lies in the caterpillars, grasshoppers and plant lice 

 eaten, which aggregate only 7 percent of the food. To quote Prof. Beal 

 "A preference for large beetles is one of the pronounced characteristics of 

 this woodpecker. Weevils Avere found in 15 stomachs, and in several 

 cases as many as ten were present. Remains of Carabid beetles were found 

 in 44 stomachs to an average of 24 percent of the contents of those that 

 contained them, or ten percent of all. The fact that 43 percent of all the 

 birds taken had eaten these beetles, some of them to the extent of 16 

 individuals, shows a decided fondness for these insects, and taken with the 

 fact that 5 stomachs contained Cicindelids or tiger beetles forms a rather 

 strong indictment against the bird.'' In Tazewell county. 111., Professor 

 Forbes found it eating cankerworms freely in orchards overrun with them. 



The 47 per cent of vegetable food covered 33 percent of fruit, much of it 

 cultivated, and a considerable amount of corn, much of it in the milk. 

 Among the cultivated fruits eaten freely were apples, pears, cherries, black- 

 berries, raspberries and strawberries, besides many wild fruits. The 

 Red-head is also known to eat both cultivated and wild grapes in quantity. 

 During autumn and winter it eats large numbers of acorns and beech nuts 

 and sometimes stores these away in large quantities in hollow trees, fence- 

 posts and similar cavities. 



Practically the only favorable statement that can be made in regard 

 to the vegetable food of this bird is the fact that it does not seem to eat 

 the berries of poison sumac or poison ivy, and so is not one of the birds 

 responsible for the dis.tribution of these noxious plants. 



One disagreeable trait which has been observed several times is its habit 

 of eating the eggs and even the young of other birds, and this not always 

 for the sake of getting them out of coveted nesting places, but apparently 

 from hunger, or from mere mischief. Dr. R. H. Wolcott wiites that he has 

 seen this bird destroy the eggs of the Wood Thrush and suspected it of other 

 depredations. Bendire gives several instances of what he calls its "cana- 

 balistic tendency." 



Captain Bendire describes its notes as follows: "Its ordinary call-note 

 is a loud tchur-tchur ; when chasing each other a shrill note like charr-charr 

 is frequently uttered, an alarm is expressed by a harsh rattling note as 

 well as by one, which, according to Mr. Otto Widmann, is indistinguishable 

 from the note of the tree frog. He tells me that both bird and frog some- 

 times answer each other. * * * From an economic view it appears 

 to me certainly to do fully as much if not more harm than good, and 1 

 consider it less worthy of protection than any of our woodpeckers, the 

 Yellow-breasted Sapsucker not excepted." 



