188 BULLETIN 17 4, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



scribed the awakening thus: "There are eight records, when a bird 

 has been heard loudly rapping in the distance with slow and meas- 

 ured blows or has called lustily and long, sometimes answered by 

 another." 



Enemies. — The number of eggs laid suggests that there must be 

 some wastage: that somewhere in the round of life the bird must 

 be peculiarly exposed to destruction; and to this point Dr. Sutton 

 (1930) speaks: 



The Duck Hawk (Rhynchodon peregrinus anatum) appears to be the chief, in- 

 deed perhaps the only, natural enemy of this woodpecker in this State [Pennsyl- 

 vania]. At Spruce Creek, Huntingdon County, where these falcons have nested 

 for years, I found, on March 21, 1921, the head and plumage of a male wood- 

 pecker which had not been dead long. Near Palmerton, Carbon County, I saw 

 a Duck Hawk pursue and with ease strike down a pileated woodpecker that had 

 started to fly across the river. The hawk flew so fast that the woodpecker 

 seemed to have been unaware of the pursuit. A cloud of feathers burst from the 

 body of the victim as it collapsed. The duck hawk apparently winters regularly 

 along some of our streams, and takes whatever comes along, with a preference, 

 perhaps, for the somewhat larger birds; and to it the comparatively clumsy 

 log cock falls easy prey. So far as I know, neither the great horned owl nor 

 the Cooper's hawk ever captures the bird, and our stomach examinations of 

 several hundred Goshawks revealed none of its bones or plumage, though this 

 savage predator no doubt occasionally captures such birds as are to be found 

 throughout the winter. 



K. B. Simpson (1910) wrote: "I once shot a Sharp-shinned Hawk 

 that was making a desperate attempt to catch a pileated * * *, 

 A year or two ago in summer along a trout stream in virgin forest 

 back in the mountains [of northern Pennsylvania], I came to a mossy 

 spot where a pileated had been wrecked and a close inspection showed 

 the tracks of a huge wildcat who had no doubt caught the big wood- 

 pecker on the ground or on a log." See also Bendire (1895). 



In addition to man's disturbance of habitat with which this paper 

 has had largely to do, the following matters are noteworthy : 



Pennant (1785) wrote that the Indians made a practice of decking 

 their calumets with the crests of these birds. And see Bendire (1895) . 



Audubon (1842) said of the pileated woodpecker: "Its flesh is 

 tough, of a bluish tint, and smells so strongly of the worms and 

 insects on which it generally feeds, as to be extremely unpalatable." 

 Sutton (1930), however, was able to show, both by the testimony of 

 living witnesses and by written record as well, that these birds, along 

 with other smaller birds, were once commonly exposed for sale as food 

 in city markets. 



Major Bendire (1895) wrote: 



I have occasionally seen bunches of these birds, numbering from four to 

 twelve, exposed for sale in the markets of Washington, D. C. * * * I tried 

 to eat Oflie, when short of meat, while traveling through the Blue Mountains 

 of Oregon, but I certainly can not recommend it. It feeds to a great extent 



