FAMILY PICIDAE 553 



recorded in the race of this bird in California. In one instance 4 males 

 and 1 female shared in incubation in a single nest. In this there was 

 constant shifting among them, as in one 12-hour period of observa- 

 tion he noted 17 minutes as the longest period of duty for any one 

 of the company. In another nest 2 males and 2 females brought 

 food to the nestlings. The exact relationship among the adults was 

 uncertain, as the nests were too high for close, detailed observation. 

 As a species this woodpecker ranges from southwestern Oregon, 

 California, Arizona, and western Texas south through Central 

 America to western Panama, and is found again in the northern 

 Andes in Colombia. Eggs of the races found south of northernmost 

 Mexico seem not to have been reported as yet. In view of the simi- 

 larity of the subspecies striatipectus to the well-known forms of 

 the United States it seems reasonable to assume that when finally 

 described they will be similar. Bent (U.S. Nat. Mus. Bull. 174, 1939, 

 p. 214) records the eggs of the race M. f. bairdi of Oregon and 

 California as "short-ovate to elliptical-ovate. They are pure white, 

 with very little or no gloss." He states further that in this northern 

 race the bird "lays ordinarily four or five eggs ; six eggs are not very 

 rare ; and as many as ten have been found in a nest, probably the 

 product of two females." Average size, from the figures that he 

 gives, is about 26.0 X 19.8 mm. It is probable that the number of eggs 

 in the southern race may be fewer. Skutch (loc. cit., p. 363) has noted 

 that acorns are a prime source of food with these birds in Costa Rica 

 as in the North, where they store large numbers of the nuts, regu- 

 larly in holes cut in the bark of trees to receive them, one by one. 

 He observes that "in Central America they appear never to carve 

 these special holes, being content to tuck away whole or fragmented 

 acorns in such chinks and crannies as they can find already at hand in 

 the trees." The habit seems variable as Eisenmann (Auk, 1946, p. 

 250) in July 1945, near El Volcan "had no difficulty in finding a stub 

 decorated with the characteristic acorn-filled borings, and I watched 

 one bird in the process of inserting an acorn." 



CENTURUS RUBRICAPILLUS Cabanis: Wagler's woodpecker, 

 Carpintero Habado 



Figure 73 



Centurus rubricapillus Cabanis, Journ. f. Orn., vol. 10, July 1862, p. 328. 

 (Barranquilla, Atlantico, Colombia.) 



Medium size ; wings and back evenly barred with black and white. 

 Description. — Length 160-185 mm. Adult male, forehead dull 



