VI PICIDAE 461i 
is much yellower, and has a splendid orange crest on the nape, a 
yellow throat and a grey breast; C. miniatum has the crest and 
upper parts washed with red. 
The three-toed Gauropicoides raflesi of the Malay countries 
has a long black crest, and narrow, pointed tail-feathers, which 
contrast well with its golden back; the under parts are brownish. 
Asyndesmus torquatus of the Western United States has very 
peculiar hair-hke plumage below, in which the first subdivisions 
of the whitish webs are not again divided; the upper surface is 
bronzy-green, the front of the head crimson, and the collar white. 
Melanerpes is a large genus with many brilliant forms, which range 
throughout America; JZ. flavifrons being black above, with white 
rump, crimson head and breast, broad golden forehead and throat, 
and brownish chest; J2 candidus having the head and breast pure 
white, and the blackish back only relieved by a yellow band on 
the nape; whereas JZ. formicivorus is intermediate in coloration. 
The last-named, often called the Californian Woodpecker, extends 
southwards to Mexico and northwards up the Pacific Coast to 
British Columbia; it stores up acorns by inserting their upper 
halves in holes bored in the limbs of trees, which may be some- 
times seen studded with them to a height of forty feet or more.' 
Apparently this is done for the sake of the grubs in the acorns ; 
while, as its name implies, the bird also devours ants. 
Sphyropicus contains the three Sap-suckers, which together 
range throughout North America, an individual having strayed to 
Greenland. S. varius shews a striking combination of colours in 
its black and white back, crimson head and throat, black chest, and 
yellow breast, while it has the curious habit, shared by its congeners, 
of puncturing trunks of trees to obtain the sap, in which they 
delight. Sometimes the entire bole is encircled by these borings. 
Nearly all that has already been said of the Family in general, 
particularly with regard to the “drumming,” may be repeated of 
the Spotted Woodpeckers, of which Dendrocopus major and D. 
minor are the British representatives. The colours in this genus 
are black and white in varied proportions, with crimson on the 
head and often on the lower parts; a small amount of buff and 
brown being not uncommonly added, while in LD. brunneifrons, a 
1 A Mexican species stores acorns in hollow stems of plants, but subsequently 
sticks them in holes bored in branches. Baird, Brewer, and Ridgway, WV. Amer. 
Birds, ti. 1874, pp. 569-572. 
