r Auk 



162 Jenkins, Variation in the Hairy Woodpecker. L April 



J. O. Snyder, and Prof. O. P. Jenkins for numerous suggestions 

 and assistance. For the privilege of examining specimens I am 

 greatly indebted to the United States National Museum, the Cali- 

 fornia Academy of Sciences, Mr. Joseph Grinnell, and Mr. W. 

 Otto Emerson. 



The Hairy Woodpecker is a form widely distributed over the 

 continent of North America, ranging from Alaska and Hudson Bay 

 to Central America and from the Atlantic to the Pacific Oceans. 

 The bird varies somewhat in localities distant from each other so 

 that different groups have been given different subspecific nanus, 

 but from their close similarity and habits all are regarded by some 

 authors as belonging to the same species. Its nearest relative is 

 evidently the Downy Woodpecker, which is much smaller, although 

 the only difference in plumage of the Downy Woodpecker is tho 

 barring of the outer tail feathers, which are pure white in the Hairy 

 Woodpecker. In the West, although inhabiting the same general 

 localities, the two species are not often found immediately together. 

 In the East, however, this separation does not hold. The food 

 question no doubt is as vital a question with them as with any other 

 animals and on this account the birds have come to occupy the par- 

 ticular regions best supplying their wants. In the West the Downy 

 Woodpecker frequents the willows and creek beds, orchards and 

 valley districts, where it is constantly on the lookout for grubs and 

 larvse, digging them out of bark or spearing them with its long 

 pointed tongue, while the Hairy Woodpecker, a stronger, hardier 

 bird, occupies the mountainous districts and seems especially to 

 love the pine forests. Many specimens indicate this by the telltale 

 pitch left on their breasts. In the depth of winter it is found away 

 up in the Boreal Zone of the Sierras, making the chips fly in search 

 of its favorite food, undisturbed by the rigorous cold. However, 

 it is not an abundant bird and is very shy of man. When you ap- 

 proach, it sidles around on the other side of the limb and watches 

 you with one eye and if it suspects injury in the least, is gone in a 

 moment, swinging high over the tree tops uttering its shrill, quick 

 peek, peek. 



As mentioned before, the Hairy W'oodpecker differs more or less 

 in different regions, and has consequently been split up into several 

 subspecies or varieties by systematists, who recognized the differ- 



