KNIGHTS OF THE CHISEL 



birds or of people. The male of each of these wears 

 a distinguishing patch of red on the back of his head, 

 while the females are plain black and white. 



"Hairy" is the more northerly in range of the two, and 

 its nest is not so often found as the Downy's. Both of 

 them generally nest in the woods or swamps, but Downy 

 often does so in an orchard or in shade trees near the 

 house. The first nest of the Hairy which I ever found 

 was in the woods near a Barred Owl's nest. I was 

 making an afternoon call on Mrs. Owl, when I heard a 

 woodpecker hammering away very steadily. Follow- 

 ing the sound, I found a female Hairy Woodpecker 

 excavating her hole about fifteen feet up in the trunk 

 of a perfectly sound young oak. This bird is very 

 hardy and is among the first of the birds to set up 

 housekeeping in the spring, along with the Bluebird 

 and Robin. This was the middle of April, and on the 

 twenty-ninth I found her incubating four eggs in her 

 completed mansion. The wood was as hard as flint, 

 and it seems wonderful that any bird by "butting" its 

 head against material that turns the edge of a knife 

 blade should be able to dig out a burrow a foot and a 

 half deep. 



In the overflowed tract of woodland to which I have 

 already alluded, where Flickers breed so abundantly, 

 every year the Hairy and Downy are also to be found 

 if one is willing to put on long rubber boots and wade 

 about among the slippery and slimy submerged branches 

 tumbling now and then into a hole. Almost always I 



97 



