WOODPECEEBS 337 



be reached from a main branch. When suspended on a swaying stem 

 the bird would peck at the fruits in the same manner, and apparently 

 with as much energy, as when digging into a dead fir stub. Its changes 

 of position, made after one fruit cluster had been consumed and it sought 

 another, were accompanied by much flapping of wings and shaking of 

 branches, and usually by the loud kuk, kuk calls. These calls seemed to 

 be given with the bill closed or at most only slightly opened. 



It does not seem likely that the work of the pileated woodpecker, large 

 as it must be in total quantity, is in any serious way detrimental to the 

 forest. On the other hand, the birds are probably of material aid in felling 

 dead timber that would otherwise continue to occupy a place in the forest, 

 to the discouragement of younger, growing trees. 



Two nest sites were seen by us. Near Yosemite Point on June 4, 1915, 

 two or three holes, of the size for a pileated woodpecker, were located about 

 twenty feet above the ground in a huge dead and rotting fir. Two birds 

 were about and seemed attached to the locality. In Aspen Valley, at dusk 

 on the evening of October 16, 1915, a bird of this species was seen to enter 

 a nest hole about forty feet up in a dead white fir stub. This instance 

 would suggest that these birds may make use of old nesting holes as night 

 shelters during the winter months. 



California Woodpecker, Melanerpes formicivorus bairdi Ridgway 



Field characters. — Of medium size for a woodpecker, near that of robin. Conspicu- 

 ously pied with black and white; patch on wing showing conspicuously in flight, broad 

 bar across forehead, rump, and belly, white; throat yellowish white; black of chest 

 broken into streaks toward belly ; conspicuous red patch on top of head ; iris of eye white. 

 (See pi. 5&.) Sexes alike save that in female the red crown patch is smaller, being 

 separated by a black interval from white bar on forehead. Movements typically wood- 

 pecker-like. Flight undulating to a degree; a short series of strong flaps, then a deep 

 sweep on set wings. Voice: A nasal yd-Tcwp, yo.-'kup, yd-kup; or krrd-ka, Icrrd-Tca, the 

 r's rolled. 



Occurrence. — Most numerous in, and characteristic of, the Upper Sonoran Zone; 

 present also down along the Merced River, following the bordering strips of valley 

 oaks out into the Lower Sonoran San Joaquin Valley, as around Snelling; ranges upward 

 locally into Transition Zone, the highest stations being near Coulterville, at 3500 feet, 

 and near Columbia Eock, at 5200 feet, in Yosemite Valley. Apparently resident 

 throughout the year wherever it occurs at all. 



The California Woodpecker is emphatically an inhabitant of oaks, more 

 so indeed than any other species. While foraging sporadically into cotton- 

 woods and conifers, individuals may be almost always traced to head- 

 quarters among oak trees of one kind or another. This quercine attraction 

 is evidently due to the bird's constitutional hankering for acorns as a 

 staple article of diet. To tide over the annual period of famine in this 



