220 BULLETIN 17 4, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



Bendire (1895), on the other hand, says: "It is one of the most 

 restless Woodpeckers I know of, and never appears to be at a loss 

 for amusement or Avork of some kind, and no other bird belonging 

 to this family could possibly be more industrious." This was my 

 impression of it, as well as the opinion of others. 



Henry W. Henshaw (1921) evidently considered this woodpecker 

 playful, for he writes: "In searching for the motives underlying 

 the storing habit of the California Woodpecker we should not lose 

 sight of the fact that the several acts in the process, the boring of 

 the holes, the search for the acorns, the carrying them to the holes 

 and the fitting them in, bear no semblance to work in the ordinary 

 sense of the term, but is play. I have seen the birds storing acorns 

 many times, and always when thus engaged they fill the air with 

 their joyous cries and constantly play tag with each other as they 

 fly back and forth. When thus engaged they might not inaptly be 

 likened to a group of children at play." 



California woodpeckers are well known to be sociable birds and to 

 live more or less in communities or loose colonies, where food condi- 

 tions are favorable. But a most remarkable story of apparently 

 communal nesting is told by Frank A. Leach (1925). On February 

 2, 1922, he discovered these woodpeckers excavating a nest in a 

 wooden trolley pole at Diablo, Calif. He estimated that they must 

 have started work on this hole about the middle of January and 

 thinks that it was some time near the latter part of April before 

 it was finished. On March 1, he "saw two go in one after the other. 

 Both appeared to be working on the inside. Two other birds on the 

 pole showed interest in the work by remaining there and taking an 

 occasional peep into the hole." On April 3, there were "from four 

 to six woodpeckers about the place all day. On one occasion saw 

 three go into the hole. Heard digging while they were inside." 

 On April 17, he saw "three birds go into the cavity and soon after 

 heard two of them working. Four other birds were on the pole, one 

 looking into the hole." 



The above extracts from his notes, made at frequent intervals 

 and often for several days in succession, would seem to indicate that 

 at least two, and possibly three, pairs of woodpeckers assisted in 

 the excavation of that nest, but evidently their work was not very 

 efficient, as the time involved w\as unusually long. The same coop- 

 erative behavior continued during incubation of the eggs and the 

 feeding of the young, several different birds working in relays; and 

 this continued during the rearing of three broods of young that 

 season. He says that "in the case of the second brood, on eight differ- 

 ent occasions I saw three different old birds feed the young ones 

 in the nest, and at one time I witnessed a fourth one delivering food 

 to them." 



