PARTNERS FOR LIFE 221 



ground-going species of beetle. What I have called 

 the remains of the ants, contained in these excre- 

 ments, were, or seemed to be, almost the whole of 

 them — head, thorax, abdomen, legs, &c. — everything, 

 in fact, except the soft parts, and juices of the body. 

 Whether these, in the bird's crop or stomach, would 

 help to make a white milky fluid I do not know, 

 but I think that they must do. 



If the great staple of the green woodpecker's 

 food has come, now, to consist of ants, as I am sure 

 is the case, the reason of its feeding its young, not 

 as do other woodpeckers — the lesser spotted one, for 

 instance — but by regurgitation, is at once apparent. 

 Ants are too minute to be carried in the beak, and 

 must, therefore, be brought up en masse, if the young 

 are not to starve. We might, therefore, have sur- 

 mised that, if ants were the sole or chief diet, the 

 young must be fed in this way, and the fact that 

 they are fed in this way is evidence of the thing 

 which would account for it. In the green wood- 

 pecker we have an interesting example of a species 

 that has broken from the traditions of its family, and 

 is changing under our eyes ; but it does not seem to 

 attract much attention — only the inevitable number 

 of the eggs, their colour, the time at which they are 

 laid, &c. &c. 



These woodpeckers must mate, I think, for life — 

 as most birds, in my opinion, do — for they nest in 

 the same tree, year after year, and go in pairs during 

 the winter. It is very interesting, then, to see a pair 

 resting together, after they have had their fill of ant- 

 eating. First, one will fly into the nearest planta- 

 tion, or small clump of trees, on the trunk of one 



