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OBSERVATIONS ON WOODPECKERS. 
By JOHN T. CAMPBELL. 
In May, 1883, I was surveying to build a levee along the east side 
of the Wabash River in Parke County, Indiana, from the mouth of Big 
Raccoon Creek southward to within a mile of the south boundary of the 
county—twelve miles long. Near the south end of this levee was a wide 
bottom, in which I had surveyed before it was cleared. Joseph J. Daniels, 
of Rockville, Indiana, bought this land, cut out the saw timber and dead- 
ened the remainder. In the spring of 1882, these deadened trees had de- 
‘ayed enough for the woodpeckers to bore holes for their nests. There 
were easily one thousand such trees on this seven hundred acres. Bach 
tree had from three to twenty woodpecker holes. The marks of the 
great flood of 1883, in February, were very plain and could be recognized 
several years later. Of all those, probably ten thousand holes, not one 
was below the flood mark of the water of 1883. On the east side of the 
bottom the ground was very low, which made the flood marks about twenty 
feet above ground. The flood was twenty-eight feet above summer low 
water. Out west, near the river, the bottcin was high, and the flood marks 
only about eight feet above the ground. Some of the holes were within two 
feet, but above the flood mark. ‘The next year many holes were made be- 
low the flood mark, but whether they were kept above the top of the next 
and smaller flood, I did not think to notice. I ran the level over the land 
to grade it for assessment, and had a good opportunity to observe the 
holes. What is the explanation? 
Lafayette, Ind. 
