164 BULLETIN 174, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



were five more young on June 30 and they were still there on July 

 10. When I visited them on June 30, the male was in the nest, and 

 it required about five raps on the tree trunk to dislodge him, although 

 he came to the opening and looked out at each rap." 



Food. — The feeding habits of Natalie's sapsucker are apparently 

 similar to those of the species elsewhere, but Mr. Skinner tells me he 

 has "seen it drumming on firs for insects, picking insects from a 

 crotch of a lodgepole pine and catching spruce-budworm moths from 

 fir foliage." 



Behavior. — The feeding and other habits of Natalie's sapsucker 

 seems to be similar to those of the other subspecies, but Bendire 

 (1895) quotes the following notes from Denis Gale, about its behav- 

 ior around the nest, wdiich are worth repeating here : 



A marked peculiarity I have noted with Spliyrapicus thyroideiis is that tlie 

 male tal^es a lookout station upon some suitable tree, where, at the approach 

 of any possible danger, he gives the alarm by striking a short dry limb with 

 his bill, by which a peculiar vibrating sound is given out, which the female, not 

 very distant, fully understands, and is at once on the alert. If either exca- 

 vating, guarding, or covering her eggs, she will immediately look out of her 

 burrow, and, should the intruder's path lie in the direction of her nest, she 

 will silently slip away and alight in a tree some distance off, but in view of 

 both her nest and the intruder. The first or second blow of a hatchet upon 

 the tree trunk in which the nest is excavated will mark her movement again 

 by a short flight, so managed as not to increase the distance — in fact oftener 

 coming nearer. When satisfied that her treasures have been discovered, she 

 utters a peculiar, low, grating sound, not imlike the purring of a cat. The 

 male then comes to the fore and braving the danger, is very courageous, and, 

 should the eggs be far advanced in incubation, he will even enter the nest 

 when you are almost within reach of it. When the latter are rifled, he is 

 always the flrst to go in and discover the fact, often passing in and out several 

 times in a surprised sort of manner. 



CEOPHLOEUS PILEATUS PILEATUS (Linnaeus) 

 SOUTHERN PILEATED WOODPECKER 



HABITS 



The above name is now restricted to the pileated woodpeckers of 

 the Lower Austral forests of the Southern United States, except 

 southern Florida, east of the Koclvy Mountains. IVlien Outram Bangs 

 (1898) applied the name ahieticola, to the northern race, he said: 

 "Linnaeus based his Picus piUatus on Catesby and Kalm. Taking 

 Catesby as the best authority, southern South Carolina must be con- 

 sidered the type locality of the species, and birds from this region 

 are as extreme of the southern race as those from Florida." 



The southern pileated woodpecker is decidedly smaller than the 

 northern bird and somewhat darker in coloration. Ridgway (1914) 

 says of this race, in a footnote : "Some of the more northern examples 

 are quite as slaty as the extreme northern form {P. p. abieticola) but 



