1726 THE PIC ART AN BIRDS 



the greater part of their lives sitting upon the topmost or outermost branches 

 of trees, generally selecting twigs that are dry and withered for their perch, and 

 looking out for insects, which are captured flying, and which constitute their only 

 food. The swallow- winged puff birds (Chelidoptera] nest in holes in banks like 

 kingfishers, and lay white eggs." Mr. Richmond, when in Eastern Nicaragua, met 

 with Dyson's puff bird (Bucco dysoni} in the forest on the Escondido river, where 

 it was catching insects, and behaving very much like a tyrant flycatcher. He says 

 that on making a capture it would seek a new perch, flying in a leisurely way, and 

 showing considerable hesitance about selecting a place on which to settle. The 

 same observer also found the Panama puff bird (Malacoptila panamensis) on the 

 above-named river, where it was rather rare; stating that it is apparently confined 

 to the thick forests, where it keeps among the lower branches, at times even 

 descending to the bushes. A female bird shot by Mr. Richmond on the twenty - 

 third of May was ' ' about ready to deposit eggs. It was shot from a twig directly in 

 front of a hole in a bamboo, in which its nest was probably located. The stomach 

 was distended with insects, principally locusts." 



THE WOODPECKERS 

 Family PlCID^ 



Forming a kind of connecting link between the Perching Birds and the other 

 members of the present order, the woodpeckers constitute a group of considerable 

 interest. L,ike the majority of the order, the woodpeckers nest in holes, and lay 

 spotless white eggs, but instead of having either the Passerine or the bridged type 

 of palate, they have a somewhat intermediate form, in which the front of the bone 

 termed the vomer is slender, pointed, and slit, instead of being truncated. More- 

 over these birds have a distinctly climbing foot, thereby showing their affinity to the 

 other climbing members of the order, such as barbets, cuckoos, or toucans. The 

 structure of the tongue in woodpeckers is, however, entirely peculiar to the family, 

 a similar arrangement of the extensile tongue bones being elsewhere found only in 

 the humming birds and the sunbirds among the Passerines. The mechanism of the 

 woodpecker's tongue is somewhat as follows: In the majority of these birds the 

 tongue is long, worm-like, pointed, and barbed at the tip. To permit of its being 

 projected or withdrawn as required, the extremities of the supporting bones are 

 prolonged backward, sliding in a sheath, curving round the top of the skull, and 

 the glands beneath it are greatly developed, secreting a viscid fluid, covering the 

 tongue and causing insects to adhere to it. The peculiar modification of these 

 organs and their application in procuring food are, indeed, closely analogous to 

 those found in the ant-eaters and several other Mammals, and the chameleon among 

 reptiles. In some species the extremities of the tongue bones slide backward and 

 forward in the sheath as the tongue is retracted or protruded; while in others, 

 as in the common English green woodpecker, their ends are fixed to the sheath,. 



