many people who do not care for caged pets buy food for the wild birds summer 

 and winter, to bring them to their houses. Flowers cost something, too. But 

 without birds and flowers, what would the country be? Before raising his hand 

 against a bird, a man should think of many things. A man who is unfair to a bird 

 is unfair to himself. 



It would be a stingy man, indeed, who w^ould begrudge the Woodpeckers their 

 acorns and beechnuts. While the leaves are still green on the trees, the Redheads 

 discover the beechnuts and go to work. "It is a truly beautiful sight," Dr. Mer- 

 riam says, "to watch these magnificent birds creeping about after the manner of 

 Warblers, among the small branches and twigs, which bend low with their weight, 

 while picking and husking the tender nuts." 



The nuts are not always eaten on the spot, for, like their famous California 

 cousins, the Redheads store up food for winter use. All sorts of odd nooks and 

 crannies serve the Redheads for storehouses — knot-holes, pockets under patches 

 of raised bark, cracks between shingles and in fences, and even railroad ties. 

 Sometimes, instead of nuts, grasshoppers and other eatables are put away in 

 storage. The wise birds at times make real caches, concealing their stores by 

 hammering down pieces of wood or bark over them. 



Beechnuts are such a large part of the fall and winter food of the Redheads 

 in some localities that, like the gray squirrels, the birds are common in good 

 beechnut winters and absent in others. Cold and snow do not trouble them, if 

 they have plenty to eat, for, as Major Bendire says, many of them "winter along 

 our northern border, in certain years, when they can find an abundant supply 

 of food." In fact, in the greater part of the eastern states the Redhead is "a 

 rather regular resident," but in the western part of its range "it appears to migrate 

 pretty regularly," so that it is rare to see one "north of latitude 40°, in winter." 

 The western boundary of the Redhead's range is the Rocky Mountains, but east 

 of the mountains it breeds from Manitoba and northern New York south to 

 the Gulf of Mexico ; though it is a rare bird in eastern New England. 



In sections where this erratic Woodpecker migrates, it leaves its nesting- 

 grounds early in October, and returns the latter part of April or the beginning 

 of May. Before too much taken up with the serious business of life, the Redhead 

 goes gaily about, as Major Bendire says, "frolicking and playing hide-and-seek 

 with its mate, and when not so engaged, amusing itself by drumming on some 

 resonant dead limb, or on the roof and sides of houses, barns, etc." For, though 

 like other drummers, the Woodpeckers are not found in the front ranks of the 

 orchestra, they beat a royal tattoo that may well express many fine feelings. 



When the musical spring holiday is over and the birds have chosen a tree 

 for the nest, they hew out a pocket in a trunk or branch, anywhere from eight 

 to eighty feet from the ground. When the young hatch, there comes a happy 

 day for the looker-on who, by kind intent and unobtrusive way, has earned the 

 right to watch the lovely birds flying back and forth, caring for their brood. 



()7 



