MEAKNS'S WOODPECKER 225 



on the outer tail feathers. In one of these, an adult female, the marks consist 

 of indistinct white spots, mostly on the inner web. The other two, juvenile 

 females, have the outer feathers distinctly, though irregularly, barred with 

 white for about half their length. 



Food. — The food of this woodpecker is evidently similar to that 

 of other races of the species. Dr. Mearns (1890b) remarks : "Its habit 

 of industriously hoarding food in the bark of pines, and in all sorts 

 of chinks and hollows, is well known. These stores are the source of 

 unending quarrels between this woodpecker and its numerous pilfer- 

 ing enemies; and I have laid its supplies under contribution myself, 

 when short of provisions and lost from the command with which 

 I had been traveling, by filling my saddlebags with half -dried acorns 

 from under the loose bark of a dead pine." 



Behavior. — ^Mrs. Bailey (1928) says: "An odd habit of the wood- 

 peckers was happened on by Mr, Ligon in the Black Range. At dark, 

 on March 15, 1913, seeing a bird enter a hole about eight feet up in 

 an oak he closed it after it, and in the morning when he returned 

 was surprised to find six birds in the one hole. As the woodpeckers 

 do not nest until the last of May, and then in high dead pines, it was, 

 of course, a night roost." 



Ed. S. Steele (1926) tells the following story: 



I was camping in a pine forest not many miles from Reserve, N. Mex., 

 accompanied by a small English terrier. In front of my tent stood a large 

 dead pine, near the top of which there were a number of holes, evidently the 

 homes of four pairs of Ant-eating Woodpeckers {Balanosphyra formicivora 

 aculeata). A gray tassel-eared squirrel came scampering along, and was at 

 once spied by the dog, which gave chase. The squirrel ran up the dead tree 

 mentioned above, to be instantly assailed by the woodpeckers. Their constant 

 cries and their sharp bills made things so uncomfortable for the squirrel that 

 it ran down the tree to within a few feet of the dog, who sent him scampering 

 to the top again with his eight antagonists constantly flaying him. 



About this time there was a swish of wings, and a sharp-shinned hawk 

 {Accipiter velox) darted like a streak among the woodpeckers. For an instant 

 it seemed that one of them was doomed, but by a small margin it managed 

 to escape, and in an instant they had all darted to cover among the green 

 boughs of surrounding trees. All was quiet for a few brief seconds, when the 

 woodpeckers returned to the attack, except one which perched on the topmost 

 bough of a near-by tree, as guard or lookout, watching for the hawk. The 

 other seven took up the fight with the squirrel. 



In a few minutes the hawk again appeared on the scene, the guard gave a 

 shrill call of warning, and all the woodpeckers were under cover before 

 their enemy could reach them. The hawk, then, finding the birds on their 

 guard, left and did not return. The terrier soon abandoned the tree, and 

 the squirrel hurried down and scampered away; the woodpeckers quickly 

 quieted down and went peacefully about their home affairs. I believe that 

 the birds recognized in the squirrel a danger to their eggs or young. 



