288 BIRDS OP NORFOLK. 



they suggest at once the idea of some 

 external stain, and remind one of those strange-looking 

 swans' eggs occasionally met with in a marshman's 

 cottage, which owe their rich unnatural tints to the 

 "gude wife's" patience and an onion peeling. Mr. T. 

 E. Gunn, of this city, assures me that on one occasion 

 he discovered small fragments of acorns in the stomach 

 of a green woodpecker, which agrees with the statement 

 of Naumann that, besides insects and their eggs, acorns 

 also form an occasional article of diet. Bechstein 

 moreover asserts that they will crack nuts. 



PICUS MAJOR, Linnjens. 

 GREAT-SPOTTED WOODPECKER 



The Pied Woodpecker, as it is also called, though by 

 no means numerous and somewhat local in its distribu- 

 tion, is found in certain localities throughout the year, 

 and nests in our woods and plantations ; but, like the 

 previous species, probably owes its scarcity, in no small 

 degree, to the attractions of its plumage. During the 

 last few years, I have known both old and young birds, 

 and in one or two instances the eggs as well, obtained 

 during the summer months, at Earlham, Hellesdon, 

 Costessey, Melton, Rackheath, Bramerton, Framingham, 

 Kirby Cane, and Horstead, which shows them to be 

 pretty well distributed in the vicinity of Norwich, and 

 they have also been noticed during the breeding season 

 at West Harling and Attleborough ; and an old female, 

 with three young ones, was shot at Salthouse, near 

 Cromer, in June, 1863. Mr. Selby, writing of this 

 species in the north of England says " In Northumber- 

 land scarcely a year passes without some of these birds 

 being observed in the months of October and November. 



