82 BULLETIN 208, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



In their various phylogenetic branchings the picarian birds show, 

 in a very rough fashion, a correlation between food preferences and 

 family groups; thus, the barbets and toucans are largely frugivorous, 

 the woodpeckers chiefly insectivorous, although there is some over- 

 lapping in diet. It seems not improbable that cerophagy, not by 

 itself but in conjunction with a more generalized insectivorous diet, 

 may have helped to set apart, and thus to expedite, the development 

 of that picarian branch that we know as the honey-guides. That 

 this occurred early in their development as a group is indicated by 

 the fact that the existing species nearest to the hypothetical ancestral 

 stock are all wax eaters. 



