GREEN WOODPECKER. Py 
by a retrograde motion. It alights near the base, and, 
tapping at intervals to alarm any hidden insects, quickly 
makes its way to the higher part of the bole, from which 
it flies downwards to another tree, or to another part of 
the same one, to commence again ‘de novo.’ Occasionally it 
may be seen in strong hedges. In severe weather it ap- 
proaches villages and farms, searching for its food in the walls 
of old buildings and barns, as well as in the neighbouring 
trees. 
The flight of this bird is generally short, from tree to 
tree, heavy and laboured, the wings being rapidly fluttered, 
and producing a rustling noise; it gains a long reach by the 
impetus it has acquired, and then drops, the effort requiring 
to be renewed. On the ground it walks horizontally, the tail 
dragging after it. 
The ‘laugh’ of the Green Woodpecker, for so is its harsh 
note of ‘glu, glu, glu, gluck’ designated, is supposed to 
prognosticate rain; hence one of its trivial names. It is 
almost startling if suddenly and unexpectedly heard. 
Its hard and wedge-shaped bill enables it, without difficulty, 
to procure its food by boring into the decayed wood of trees, 
even through any sound exterior part, and with its long and 
extensile tongue, it extracts the insects and their eggs, spiders 
and caterpillars, on which it lives, from the crannies in the 
bark in which they lie concealed, and ants and their eggs 
from their hills; in searching for which it is frequently seen 
on the ground; and, Bewick says, uses not only its bill, but 
its feet: failing such a supply, it will eat nuts. The tongue 
is a most wonderful organ, as in the rest of the Woodpeckers. 
‘It has the appearance of a silver ribbon, or rather, from its 
transparency, a stream of molten glass; and the rapidity 
with which it is protruded and withdrawn is so great, that 
the eye is dazzled in following its motions: it is flexible in 
the highest degree.’ 
Preparations for building are commenced even so early as 
February, and the old nest is frequently resorted to and re- 
paired. The nest, if decayed wood-dust may be called such, 
is placed at a height of fifteen or twenty feet from the 
ground, in a sound hole in a tree; and it is said that the 
birds carry away the chips and fragments of wood to a distance, 
as if afraid that they might lead to a discovery of their retreat. 
If necessary, it perforates a hole, or else suits one to itself, 
with its trenchant bill, the strokes of the active worker being 
