THE BIRDS OF NEW JERSEY. 63 



distinguished from the female by the presence of black 

 stripes from the base of the bill. 



The nest is a hole dug in the trunks of dead trees and 

 resembles that of the hairy woodpecker. Mating begins 

 in April or May. The eggs are from six to eight in num- 

 ber, of a pm'e white and one and one-tenth by four-fifths 

 of an inch in size. 



Tlie bird breeds and is distributed over the whole east- 

 ern part of the United States as far west as the Rocky 

 Mountains. Some winter in New Jersey, but most of 

 them go south towards the end of October, returning to- 

 wards the end of March. 



The song is termed by Audubon "a prolonged, jovial 

 laugh, a cuh-cuh-cuh, tvick-wick- tuick,'" rapidly repeated. 

 The call is a nasal kee-yee. 



The food of this bird consists of beetles, bugs, caterpil- 

 lars, ants, grasshoppers, corn, buckwheat, berries, fruit, 

 poison ivy berries and sumac berries. Government analy- 

 ses of 230 stomachs showed that these contained fifty- 

 six per cent, of animal matter, bugs, etc., 39 per cent, 

 vegetable matter and five per cent, of sand and mineral 

 matter. Over forty per cent, of the food of these birds 

 consists of ants, as high as three thousand each being 

 found in several stomachs. Other stomachs contained 

 from eighteen to forty -eight grasshopi)ers. 



Fh/efftrher^ ,tr€tflian. — Length, five and three-quar- 

 ter inches; extent, nine inches; bill, one-third of 

 an incli; above, uniform olive green; wings and tail, 

 brownish, the former edged with dull white; beneath, 

 white tinged with olive; sides, yellowish; feet, dusky; bill, 

 dusky above, yellow beneath. Sexes alike. 



The nest is so shallow that the eggs can sometimes be 

 seen from underneath; it is built of plant stems and 

 grasses and frequently of blossoms of oak; it is generally 

 found in the fork of a slender branch about si.x or eight 

 feet from the groiiiul. The eggs are three or foui- in num- 



