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Mr. P. F. M. Galloway,



for especially in winter. They, in the wild state, live almost en¬

tirely upon live ants and their cocoons ; in the winter they hunt

about the banks under woods, also forage about in meadows,

especially where there are large ant hills, and they probe very deeply

into these in order to extract the ants. These birds can stand

any amount of cold, as long as they are able to find this food,

but, although they can stand the cold, yet this species is about the

first to die of starvation if snow should fall deeply, on account of

their food supply being covered up. In captivity this bird should

have a roomy cage, box pattern, with pieces of hard oak bark fixed

for them to climb upon ; virgin cork for any woodpecker is destroyed

very quickly as it is too soft and they will quickly riddle it with

their strong bills. The cage must be lined throughout with zinc

(which of course can be enamelled), if this is not done the bird

will soon make great holes through the cage in no time.


The food should consist of a good well-balanced insectile

mixture, made crumbly moist with scalding water; when this food

is ready add a piece of York cheese about the size of a walnut, first

chopping it finely, adding a little dry biscuit dust to prevent it

sticking to the knife ; sprinkle this amongst the prepared soft food

in the proportion of a couple of tablespoonfuls of soft food to the

piece of cheese mentioned. So much for what I term the stock food.


Now live insect diet. As long as live fresh ants’ eggs can be

got, stir a tablespoonful of these into the pi-epared food and no other

live food is necessary until the end of July. This is the time to

begin giving a few mealworms and clean gentles .as well as the fresh

ants eggs, so that you will have time to wean the bird gradually

from the ants’ eggs on to the other live diet before the eggs are over.

By October you have another change of live food to fall back on

and these are wasp grubs, and they can be had fresh for some time;

afterwards they can be had preserved, and in the latter stage they

should be shaken out of the comb into a tin and boiled for ten

minutes, when they will become quite soft and white and the birds

will do well if given some of these each time he is fed.


The greater and lesser spotted woodpecker, especially the

lattei', requires a plainer diet, otherwise they will be liable to develop

fits. Their diet should consist of insectile food and half the quan-



