146 BULLETIN 174, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



SPHYRAPICUS VARIUS DAGGETTI Grinnell 

 SOUTHERN RED-BREASTED SAPSUCKER 

 HABITS 



The above name was applied to this sapsucker by Dr. Joseph Grin- 

 nell (1901) and was characterized by him as smaller and paler than 

 the northern race and with a maximum extent of white markings. 

 It is evidently a well-marked race. But whether the red-breasted 

 sapsucker should be considered a subspecies of the yellow-bellied sap- 

 sucker seems to me to be a decidedly open question, on which authori- 

 ties seem to have differed, or to have changed their minds. In support 

 of his views, Dr. Grinnell (1901) says : "I have examined a number of 

 skins of the nuchalis type, and others approaching ruber in almost 

 every degree, and I am certain that there is a continuous intergrada- 

 tion geographically between the eastern S. varius and ruber of the 

 Pacific Coast. The intermediates do not appear to be the result of 

 'hybridization' and the case does not seem to be at all parallel to that 

 of Colaptes auratus and C. cafer. Therefore I see no reason why the 

 Red-breasted Sapsucker is of more than subspecific rank," 



It is interesting to note that Ridgway used the name Sphyrapicus 

 varius ruber in 1872 and again in 1874 (Ridgway, 1914, in synonymy), 

 but 40 years later (1914) he gave the red-breasted sapsucker full spe- 

 cific rank, apparently having changed his mind. And, in the same 

 work, in a footnote under the red-naped sapsucker, referring to the 

 intergrades mentioned by Dr. Grinnell, he says: "But they may be 

 (and I believe are) hybrids ; certainly there is no more reason for not 

 considering them as such than in the case of Colaptes.''^ 



Certainly the red-breasted sapsucker and the yellow-bellied sap- 

 sucker are as much unlike in appearance as the two flickers; and the 

 hybrid flickers certainly show "every degree" of intergradation. In 

 the large series of sapsuckers that I have examined, containing 87 typi- 

 cal ruber and 86 typical nuchalis^ I was able to find only 8 specimens 

 that could, by any stretch of the imagination, be considered as inter- 

 mediates; I believe that these intergrading sapsuckers will prove to 

 be relatively less common than are the hybrids between the two flickers. 



It is interesting, too, to note that the first three editions of the 

 A. O. U. Check-List, 1886, 1895, and 1910, all gave the red-breasted 

 sapsucker full specific rank, in spite of the fact that Ridgway had 

 called it a subspecies of the yellow-bellied in 1872, and Grinnell had 

 done the same in 1901. But the fourth edition, 1931, adopts the sub- 

 species theory, in spite of Ridg way's latest decision. 



The southern race of the red-breasted sapsucker breeds in the 

 Canadian and Transition Zones in the mountains of California, from 

 the Trinity and Warner Mountains southward to the San Jacinto 

 Mountains. Grinnell and Storer (1924) say that it "is found in the 



