MEAEISrS'S GILDED FLICKER 301 



COLAPTES CHRYSOIDES MEARNSI Ridgway 

 MEARNS'S GILDED FLICKER 



Plate 39 

 HABITS 



Mearns's gilded flicker is the best known of the three races of this 

 handsome species. Its range is along our southwestern border in 

 southwestern Arizona, extreme southeastern California, and in So- 

 nora, Mexico. It is confined almost entirely, especially in the breed- 

 ing season, to the giant cactus region in this area; its distribution 

 seems to be mainly governed by the distribution of this cactus, on 

 which it seems to depend for most of the necessities of life. M. 

 French Gilman (1915) puts it very well, as follows: "The giant cactus 

 is to this Flicker and the Gila Woodpecker, what the bamboo is to 

 the inhabitants of some of the eastern islands. * * * The cactus 

 furnishes the birds with home, shelter, food and possibly drink. They 

 roost in the holes and seek them as retreat from rain storms." But 

 he says that this flicker is also "found in cottonwood and willow- 

 groves as well as wherever the giant cactus grows." 



W. E. D. Scott (1886) writes: "A rather common resident where- 

 ever the giant cactus occurs throughout the region, but is much more 

 common in the giant cactus of the southern part of the area under 

 consideration [southern Arizona] than to the northward. They are 

 common all about Tucson in such localities as I have indicated, but 

 are more rare in the San Pedro Valley. I have met with the species 

 in early spring and fall on the San Pedro slope of the Catalinas as 

 high up as 3,000 feet. I have now and then seen single individuals 

 in the mesquite timber, far from any giant cactus. All that I have 

 ever met with breeding have been in giant cactus." 



Nesting.— Wq spent three days, ISIay 21, 22, and 23, 1922, col- 

 lecting on the giant-cactus plains near Tucson, Ariz., between the 

 mesquite forest to the southward and the Catalina Mountains to 

 the eastward from Tucson. Here we found ISIearns's gilded flicker 

 very common; we climbed to and examined seven nests and prob- 

 ably passed by a number of others. The nests were all in the 

 giant cactus, at heights ranging from 12 to 20 feet from the ground; 

 the only cavity measured was about 24 inches deep. We were rather 

 too late for eggs of this species, as many of the nests held large 

 young, two in each nest examined, never more nor fewer. On May 22 

 we found a nest containing two fresh eggs and another nest with four 

 addled eggs, probably deserted. At one of the first nests that I 

 examined I was surprised, when I inserted my hand, to feel some- 

 thing cold and clammy; my hand was quickly withdrawn and the 

 hole was chopped out, revealing a large gopher snake that had killed 



