THE CALIFOENIAN WOODPECKER. 113 



in the billy country in the vicinity of Harris Lake, near the head waters of 

 the Guadalupe River, in Kerr County, Texas. A female, shot on November 25, 

 1894, in the vicinity of this lake, was recently sent me for examination by Mr. 

 H. P. Attwater, of San Antonio, Texas, and he writes me that it is reported 

 as fairly common there in winter, and may possibly also breed there. This, 

 as far as I can ascertain, marks the most eastern point of its known range within 

 our borders. 



Messrs. L. Belding and A. W. Anthony both met with the Californian Wood- 

 pecker in northern Lower California, and it is well known to be a common 

 inhabitant of many localities in northern Mexico. It is usually a resident and 

 breeds wherever found, and it is generally more partial to the canyons and 

 foothill regions than to the extensive level tracts and larger valleys. 



The Californian Woodpecker is by far the most social representative of 

 this fixmily found within the United States, and it is no unusual occurrence to 

 see half a dozen or more in a single tree. It is also a well-disposed bird, and 

 seldom quarrels or tights with its own kind or with smaller species; but it most 

 emphatically resents the thieving propensities of the different Jays, Magpies, 

 and Squirrels, when caught trespassing on its winter stores, attacking these 

 intruders with such vigor and persistency that they are compelled to vacate 

 the premises in a hurry. Its manner of flight and call notes closely resemble 

 those of the Red-headed Woodpecker, and, like it, it loves to cling to some 

 convenient dead limb near the top of a tree and druni for hours at a time. It 

 is one of the most restless Woodpeckers I know of, and never appears to be at 

 a loss for amusement or work of some kind, and no other bird belon"-ino- to this 

 family could possibly be more industrious. During the spring- and summer 

 its food consists, to a great extent, of insects, including grasshoppers, ants, 

 beetles, and different species of flies, varied occasionally with fruit, such as 

 cherries, which are carried off whole, apples, figs, and also berries and green 

 corn; but acorns always form its principal food supply during the greater 

 portion of the year, and large numbers are stored away by it in the thick 

 bark of pines, as well as in dry and partly rotten limbs of oak and other trees, 

 also in telegraph poles and fence posts. This peculiar habit of storing acorns 

 in receptacles especially made for this purpose, and not under loose bark or 

 similar hiding places, seems, however, to be principally confined to the birds 

 found in California and southwestern Oregon, while it has not as yet been noted, 

 to the same extent at least, in the somewhat smaller birds found in Arizona 

 and New Mexico; and this habit is far too noticeable to have been overlooked 

 by the many careful ornithologists who have visited Arizona since I was there 

 in 1872 and 1873, and have had far better opportunities for observing its haliits 

 than I enjoyed. Although I traveled over considerable areas in both years 

 where these bu-ds were fairly common in places, I saw no evidence of their 

 storing acorns in the way they do in tlie more northern parts of their i-ange, 

 though I must confess that I was then generally far more on the lookout for 

 hostile Indians than ornithological matters. 



16896— No. 3 8 



