148 



BIRDS OF AMERICA 



spot without bird-like suggestions. On the other 

 hand, when the bird is exploring the light-barked 

 young Shasta firs or gray barkless tracts of old 

 trees, the white of the head tones in with the 

 gray and is lost, the headless back becoming 

 only a shadow or scar. But the most surprising 

 thing of all is to see the sun streaming full on 

 the white head and find that the bird form is 

 lost. The white in this case is so glaring that it 

 fills the eye and carries it over to the light streaks 

 on the bark, making the black sink away as 



insignificant. All this applies, however, only 

 when the bird is quiet ; in motion he is strikingly 

 conspicuous, and in flight his white wing streak 

 makes another good recognition mark." 



William L. Finley. 



The most pronounced characteristic of the 

 White-headed Woodpecker is its fondness for 

 the seeds of pines. These constitute more than 

 half of its food. The remainder of its food is 

 insects and half of these are ants. 



ARCTIC THREE-TOED WOODPECKER 

 Picoides arcticus {Szvainson) 



A. O. v. Number 400 



Other Name. — Black-backed Three-toed Wood- 

 pecker. 



General Description. — Length, g'A inches. Upper 

 parts, black and white, the black predominating; under 

 parts, white. 



Color. — Adult Male : Crown, bright yellow to 

 orange; rest of head except (usually) extreme front of 

 forehead, hindneck, and sides of neck, uniform glossy 

 blue-black; rest of upper parts, black, or sooty-black, 

 the shoulders and back broadly margined with glossy 

 blue-black, the lesser wing-coverts narrowly margined 

 with the same, the middle wing-coverts and upper tail- 

 coverts margined with deeper black than central por- 

 tion; outer webs of wings, except inner secondaries, 

 spotted with white ; four middle tail feathers, black, the 

 next pair mostly black, extremities brownish-white, 

 usually tipped with black, the three lateral pairs mostly 

 white, tinged terminally with brownish; nasal tufts 

 dusky, sometimes finely streaked with paler ; extreme 

 front of forehead, usually white, grayish white, or pale 

 grayish, a broad white stripe extending thence across 

 lores and beneath eyes to side of neck ; cheeks, black or 



See Color Plate 60 



blue-black, forming a stripe which extends behind 

 across sides of neck, where usually confluent with the 

 black neck area ; under parts, white, the sides and 

 flanks broadly barred with black, the bars less regular 

 and sometimes broken into spots or streaks on front of 

 sides ; bill, slate color ; iris, reddish-brown or chestnut. 

 Adult Female: Similar to the adult male, but witlioul 

 any yellow on crown, the entire crown being uniform 

 glossy blue-black. 



Nest and Eggs. — Xest ; In a tree, usually an ever- 

 green, not over 15 feet up. Eggs: 4 to 6. white. 



Distribution. — North America ; north to central 

 Alaska, Yukon, southern Mackenzie, central Keewatin, 

 and northern Ungava ; breeding southward to Maine, 

 New Hampshire, Vermont, northern New York, north- 

 ern Ontario, northern Michigan, northern Minnesota, 

 Montana, Wyoming, Oregon, and northeastern Cali- 

 fornia ; in winter, irregularly southward to Massachu- 

 setts, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, southern Ontario, 

 northern Ohio, northeastern Illinois, Wisconsin, eastern 

 Nebraska, and in Sierra Nevada to latitude 39° or 

 farther. 



Drawing by R. I. Btasher 

 ARCTIC THREE-TOED WOODPECKER ( ] nat. size) 

 Too much interested in his own affairs to pay attention to you 



The Arctic, or Black-backed, Three-toed Wood- 

 pecker is a bird of the northern forests. Observa- 

 tions of this bird are made very rarely except in 

 the belts of spruce and balsam. Even there one 

 is more sure of finding them in the burned areas 

 where the dead stubs rise thirty and more feet 

 high. The bird is never common anywhere. 

 Manly Hardy wrote from Maine to Captain 

 Bendire that this bird " is rarely, if ever, found 

 in any numbers far from burnt tracts ; if in 

 green growth, usuallv singly, or at most in pairs ; 

 but on newly burnt lands specimens may be 

 found by the score, and their sharp, shrill chirk, 

 chirk can be heard in all directions." 



The very raritv of this bird makes the finding 

 of one an event in bird observations. The three 

 toes will not be observed as the bird clings to a 

 tall dead stub or a thick branched spruce, but 

 the plain black back and the yellow front of the 

 head of the male are distinctive. 



