RED-BELLIED WOODPECKER 237 



Casual records. — Lewis's woodpecker has been taken on several 

 occasions at points east of its normal range. Among these records 

 •are Alberta, Castor, May 7 and 9, 1924 ; Big Hay Lake, October 12, 

 1930; and Lesser Slave Lake, May 22, 1928; Saskatchewan, one speci- 

 men at Herschel on September 23, 1914, three in the Qu'Appelle 

 Valley, one from near Eastend on September 19, 1915, two in the 

 same vicinity on September 24, 1929, and two in the summer of 1931 ; 

 North Dakota, a specimen was taken at Neche, on October 13, 1916, 

 and one was noted at Grafton on October 10, 1926; Nebraska, re- 

 corded at Long Pine during the winter of 1898-99 ; Kansas, a speci- 

 men at Ellis on May 6, 1878, and another near Lawrence on Novem- 

 ber 7, 1908; eastern Oklahoma, one w^as carefully observed near 

 Tulsa on December 24, 1922; Iowa, recorded at Sioux City from 

 November 28, 1928, to April 7, 1929; Illinois, one recorded from 

 Chicago on May 24, 1923, and another from Argo on May 14, 1932 ; 

 and Rhode Island, a specimen collected at Mount Pleasant, near 

 Providence, on November 16, 1928, 



Egg dates. — California: 19 records, April 18 to June 10; 10 

 records. May 3 to 28, indicating the height of the season. 



Colorado : 30 records. May 8 to August 6 ; 15 records, June 2 to 20. 



Oregon: 18 records. May 17 to June 24; 9 records, May 30 to 

 June 10. 



British Columbia : 6 records, May 31 to June 15. 



CENTURUS CAROLINUS (Linnaeus) 



RED-BELLIED WOODPECKER 



Plates 30, 31 



HABITS 



This showy and noisy woodpecker enjoys a wide distribution 

 throughout much of the eastern half of the United States, except the 

 most northern and northeastern States. Throughout much of this 

 range, it is one of the commonest and most conspicuous of the wood- 

 peckers. Arthur H. Howell (1932) writes: "In Florida, red-bellied 

 woodpeckers are found chiefly in hammocks, groves, and wet bottom- 

 land timber, less commonly in the pine woods and the cypress 

 swamps. * * * These woodpeckers are not particularly shy, and 

 they often visit dooryards and orchards." In Texas, according to 

 George Finlay Simmons (1925), its favorite haunts are ''heavily 

 timbered bottom lands or swampy woods; open deciduous or mixed 

 coniferous woodlands with very large trees; heavy woods of oak and 

 elm along river and creek bottoms; shade trees and dead trees in 

 town." Major Bendire (1895) says: "Throughout the northern por- 

 tions of its range it prefers deciduous or mixed forests to coniferous, 

 but in the south it is apparently as common in the flat, low pine woods 



