26 BULLETIN 174, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



Ernest Thompson Seton (1890) found a nest in a tall poplar tree 

 about 30 feet from the ground, in Manitoba; the hole was about 

 a foot deep, 3 inches wide inside and 2 inches at the entrance. John 

 Macoun (1909) quotes Kev. C. J. Young as saying: "Most of the 

 nests I have seen have been in wet places or near water, and almost 

 all were in white ash trees, from thirty to fifty feet from the ground. 

 Two nests were in elm trees and one in a telegraph pole by the 

 roadside not more than ten feet from the ground." 



Eoderick MacFarlane (1908) writes: "On the 6th of May, 1885, 

 Mr, Reid discovered a nest in a hole in a dry standing poplar tree 

 near Fort Providence. There were eight eggs therein, and the 

 parent was seen and shot. * * * At Fort St, James, Stuart's 

 Lake, on the 25th of May, 1889, a native hunter found a nest holding 

 four fresh eggs in a similar position. Both parents in this instance 

 were also observed near by and shot. On 4th June, in the same lo- 

 cality, an Indian girl brought us four eggs. * * * The nest was 

 found in a hole in a dry pine tree, at a height of several feet above 

 the ground." 



Henry Mousley (1916) says that near Hatley, Quebec, "as a rule 

 the nest hole is somewhat high up but on one occasion I found one 

 which was only three feet above the ground in a birch stub, contain- 

 ing four eggs, the entrance hole being two inches in diameter, extreme 

 depth eleven inches and average width two and three quarters 

 inches." 



P. B. Philipp and B, S. Bowdish (1919), referring to northern 

 New Brunswick, say : "A nest with young was found in a dead maple 

 stub in a burnt barren, on May 29, 1917. On May 30 of the same 

 year another nest about fifteen feet up in a dead maple stub in a 

 similar situation, contained four eggs, very slightly incubated. On 

 June 9, 1917, a third nest in a cedar telephone pole beside a public 

 road was examined. It was at a height of about nine feet; cavity 

 141/^ inches deep; entrance 21/8 inches in height by 21^ inches in 

 width. This nest contained four nearly fresh eggs." 



Eggs. — The northern hairy woodpecker lays three to five eggs ; the 

 eight eggs mentioned above by MacFarlane may have been the prod- 

 uct of two females or eggs of the boreal flicker; in the latter casa 

 the collector may have shot the wrong parent. The eggs are like those 

 of the eastern hairy woodpecker but average slightly larger. The 

 measurements of 41 eggs average 25.39 by 20.10 millimeters ; the eggs 

 showing the four extremes measure 28.45 by 22.10, 27.43 by 22.35, 

 and 21.5 by 16.6 millimeters. 



The plumage changes, food, behavior, voice, and other habits ap- 

 parently do not differ materially from those of its southern relative. 

 It is said to be a permanent resident throughout its range, but there 



