600 S YS TEMA TIC SYNOPSIS. — PICARIAi — PI CI. 



of C- mexicanics, a change accompanied with another affecting the peculiar lilac-hrown of 

 throat and olive-brown of back, which become respectively ashen and purplish-gray. One 

 of the most abundant and best-known species of the family, in any woodland, sometimes for- 

 aging for food in open country far from trees : a great ant-eater and berry-|)icker. A lively 

 bird, of sunny temperament, like its feathers, faithful and devoted, assiduous and successful in 

 domestic affairs, and a good housekeeper. The bill of the Flicker is not so strong a "hammer 

 and tongs " as that of most Woodpeckers, and the bird excavates sound wood for a nest less 

 extensively than those of other genera ; it generally takes advantage of natural holes in de- 

 cayed trees, stumps, posts, etc., and sometimes selects very odd nooks — it is known to have 

 burrowed even a haystack, and has nested within buildings. Eggs 5-9, usually 6 or 7 ; under 

 exceptional circumstances 18 to 23 have been taken from one hole; a case is recorded of 19 

 young birds in good order in one nest; and another in which systematic robbery induced one 

 bird to lay 71 eggs in 73 days! The eggs average 1.10 X 0.85, with extremes of 1.20 X 

 0.90 and 0.97 X 0.82 in a series of 196 measurements (Bendire). 



C. a. lu'teus. (Lat. lutetis, yelhtwish, luteous.) Northern Flicker. This name desig- 

 nates northerly specimens of the common Flicker, with those who wish to restrict the name 

 auratus to S. Atlantic and Gulf Coast specimens. Eange given as from N. Carolina north- 

 ward, west to the Rocky Mts., and occasional on the Pacific slope from California northward. 

 Bangs, Auk, Apr. 1898, p. 177: A 0. U. Suppl. List, Auk, Jan. 1899, p. HI, No. 412a. 

 [C. ayresi (AUD.). C. hybridus (Bd.). C. aurato-inexicaiius (Sund.). Ayres' Wood- 

 pecker. Hybrid Flicker. Yellow-and-red-shaftkd Flicker. A species, subspe- 

 cies, varietv, race, strain, hybrid, or transitional form, in wliich the respective characters of 

 C. auratus and C mexicanus are blended in every conceivable degree in different specimens. 

 Moustaches red or black, or partly both, on one or both sides of the body, and present or ab- 

 sent in the 9 ; red moustaches present with yellow wings and tail, or black ones with red 

 wings and tail. Red nuchal crescent present or absent ; present in connection with red wings 

 and tail. Either of the foregoing features concurrent with ashy or with lilac brown throat; 

 either color of throat coincident with yellow or with red wings and tail. Wings and tail gilded 

 on some of the feathers, rubricated (m others on one or both sides. Such Flickers prevail 

 widely in the Rocky Mountain region, in some parts to the exclusion of birds showing the 

 proper characters of either species. The case is unique in ornithology, and has proved refrac- 

 tory to the machinery of zoological classification — tot homines, tot sententice. It was first 

 brought to light in 1843, when Audubon found tlie birds he subsequently named C ayresii at 

 old Fort Union, at the mouth of the Yellowstone river, on l\\e Miss(juri, at the present border 

 between North Dakota and ]Montana; I liave read in liis manuscript, penned on the spot, his 

 naive expressions of amazement at a phenomenon which has served to pique curiosity and 

 complete perplexity from that day to tliis. But to me it seems a simple case of hybridization 

 on a grand scale, with reproduction of fertile offspring sharing the characters of both parents, 

 and perpetuating their mixed kind, no doubt with repeated or continuous infusion of pure blood 

 from each side of the house. But so remarkable a result of interbreeding or intergradation should 

 not be ignored, as it is in the A. 0. U. List ; and I see no objection to giving it a name. No 

 one objects to the term Canis familiaris for the domestic dog, which is certainly a composite 

 product of various canine ancestry.] 



C. mexica'nus. (Of Mexico.) Red-shafted Woodpecker. Mexican Flicker. Back, 

 rump, and upper surfaces of wings and tail as in C auratus, but a different shade of color, a 

 faintly reddish replacing the olivaceous tinge of the common brownish ground-color. Wings 

 and tail of the same pattern, but the auration replaced by rubefaction, the under surfaces being 

 thus orange-red or even vermilion, instead of golden-yellow. Top of head like the throat of 

 C. auratus, but more cinnamon than lilac-brown, especially on the forehead ; no occipital red 

 crescent in either sex. Throat and sides of head and neck clear ash, with scarlet maxillary 



