A QUARTET OF WOODLAND DRUMMERS 207 



The flicker is more of a ground bird than any other 

 of our woodpeckers. He is fond of digging in the fields 

 and pastures for grubs and earthworms. His bill is not 

 straight and chisel-shaped at the end like that of other 

 members of his family, but it is slightly curved like the 

 bill of a thrush and is quite pointed, a thing which aids 

 him much in digging. He drives it into the ground much 

 as one might drive a pickaxe, making the clods fly in a 

 lively manner. 



Often the flicker will attack ant-hills, spading the nests 

 out with his powerful bill, and eating the ants and their 

 larvae in numbers. Different kinds of fruit and berries, 

 such as cherries, mulberries and wild grapes, add variety 

 to his bill of fare. In the early winter, when other fruit 

 has become scarce, he enjoys a few persimmons now and 

 then for his dessert. But his bread of life is a diet of ants, 

 and he has been known to eat as many as three thousand 

 at a single meal. 



From five to seven white eggs are usually laid. When 

 all but one of these are taken out of the nest flickers have 

 been known on some occasions to continue laying one a 

 day for a long time, as does a domestic fowl. A flicker 

 near Greensboro, North Carolina, laid in this way more 

 than thirty. One in Massachusetts once laid seventy-one 

 eggs in seventy-three days. 



