144 OUR RARER BRITISH BREEDING BIRDS. 



species occupying the same nesting site for as 

 many as thirty years in succession. I have never 

 known a hole used two seasons on end, because 

 of the Starling's aptitude for finding and promptly 

 lining and utilising such an excavation for its 

 own purposes. Indeed, the legitimate owner is 

 frequently robbed of its breeding-hole directly it 

 has been dug; and owing to the persistent persecu- 

 tion undergone, it is useless to look for the eggs 

 of the Green Woodpecker in many parts of the 

 country until the Starling has chosen its nesting 

 site and settled down to the serious work of 

 nidification. 



The hole in the dead tree figured in our 

 illustration was dug and occupied by a pair of 

 Green Woodpeckers last year, but was confiscated 

 quite early in the spring of the present one by 

 Starlings. It was about two and a half inches in 

 diameter, did not go to the centre of the trunk 

 before descending, and was about twelve inches 

 deep. 



The eggs number from five to seven or eight, 

 are pure white, glossy and unspotted, and can 

 hardly be mistaken for those of any other species 

 breeding in a similar situation on account of their 

 larger size. 



WOODPECKER, LESSER SPOTTED, 



THE Lesser Spotted Woodpecker, although local, 

 is by no means a rare bird in suitable parts of 

 England south of Yorkshire and east of Cornwall. 

 I had a pair under observation in Surrey for some 

 time last spring, and frequently heard and saw 

 one of them producing its resonant hammering on 



