P I C U S. 



44 1 



are easily observed, and the use of them in the 

 economy of nature is well understood ; but \ve are 

 not so vvell acquainted with those characters of the 

 vegetation of countries where there are no wood- 

 peckers which enable them to be dispensed with, and 

 still all the purposes of nature in the forest to be 

 kept up. 



As the woodpecker may be said to be made for 

 the tree, the tree appears to be made for the wood- 

 pecker. In the former respect, the adaptation of the 

 bird extends even to colour ; for woodpeckers found 

 in countries whose forests arc different, are differently 

 coloured. Then the bird is quite at home in the 

 tree, which is to it the scene of all its operations. It 

 is its dwelling-, its pasture, the resting 1 place for its 

 young, and occasionally as is said a sort of rude mu- 

 sical instrument, by means of which the bird calls, 

 and its mate answers to it. 



The sound of the woodpecker is not so frequently 

 heard in the winter ; but when the spring- begins to 

 call the slumbering- world to new life, the woodpecker 

 soon partakes in the impulse of the season. Its iirst. 

 or at all events its loudest labours, of hammering- the 

 tree, are not for the purpose of feeding itself, but 

 seem rather to be a kind of pairing call ; and it is not 

 a little remarkable that this call should be a repetition 

 of that sound which the bird most frequently makes in 

 the performance of its appointed labour. The male 

 woodpecker is said to be the one which practises, or 

 at all events begins, this curious species of signal- 

 giving. He finds a hollow portion of the tree, and 

 beats it like a drum with varied pitches and cadences. 

 If a female answers, a, place for the nest is soon 

 looked for ; and if it be necessary to excavate any 

 portion of the tree in order to make the nest big 

 enough, the pair feed and labour by turns until it is 

 accomplished. They seldom mistake their proper 

 tree, or the proper place of the tree, either for nest- 

 ling or for a supply of food. We must not wonder 

 at this, or give the woodpecker credit for any fore- 

 thought purpose ; because there is no more approxi- 

 mation to reason in any thing that a woodpecker 

 does after it comes out of the shell, than there is in 

 its coming out of that shell a woodpeckW and not any 

 other bird. Still woodpeckers, both on their own 

 account, and on account of the fact of their being 

 closely associated with the majesty of forests, are 

 highly interesting creatures, and we regret that we 

 cannot, consistently with our limits, go farther into 

 their general hi-story. As little can we afford to 

 enumerate all the species, which are very many ; 

 but must content ourselves with one or two of each 

 great division of the world in which they are found. 



The Green Woodpecker (P. viriilus). This is by 

 way of eminence the woodpecker of Britain, at least 

 in those parts of the country where the woods con- 

 sist chiefly of deciduous trees, and the same may be 

 said of great part of continental Europe. As such 

 it has been long known, and has as many names even, 

 in the English language, as a Spanish hidalgo. The 

 length of the green woodpecker is about thirteen 

 inches, and the stretch of its wings about a foot and a 

 half. The bill is two inches long, and of a duky 

 colour. The tongue is of considerable length. The 

 hides is white, the eyes are surrounded with black, 

 beneath which, in the male bird, there is a crimson 

 spot bordered with black, which, in the female, is 

 entirely black. The feathers on the top of the 

 head are dusky, with cinereous tips. The lesser 



coverts of the wings, the scapulars, back, and neck, 

 are green. The quills are dusky, the greater ones 

 bein- spotted on oach web with white, and the lesser 

 faintly spotted with the same colour on the exterior 

 webs, and richly bordered with green. The rump is 

 pale vellow ; the coverts of the cars and whole under 

 parts are of a pale yellowish green ; the feathers of 

 the tail are strong and pointed, alternately barred with 

 dusky colour and green, tipped with black, except the 

 outer ones. The claws are pretty much hooked ; and 

 the naked parts of the legs are ash-coloured. This 

 species generally have four or five eggs in a hatch. 

 They are of a transparent white or greenish hue, 

 marked with little black spots. They are placed 

 among the rotten wood in a hole of a tree, generally 

 some fifteen or twenty feet from the ground. Some- 

 times a little wool or soft vegetable substance is used 

 as a bed for the eggs, but this is more frequently dis- 

 pensed with. In the breeding season the pair are 

 very affectionate, and seldom separate. They are 

 uncommonly regular in their habits, go early to rest, 

 and do not leave their nest till sunrise. The prac- 

 tice of early roosting is also observed by the young 

 birds, which may be seen scrambling about the tree 

 in which their nest is situated, some time before they 

 are able to take wing. If it is intended to attempt 

 the taming of these birds, it must be begun very 

 early, and even then the chance of success is very 

 slight. They are very strong, and very impatient of 

 confinement ; and they use their bills with great 

 effect upon all wooden substances to which they have 

 access. There is, however, no great inducement to 

 the taming of them, as they have no song to compen- 

 sate for the trouble. 



There are two if not three woodpeckers which 

 occur in Europe besides the green one, and one of 

 them at least occurs in some of the upland and lonely 

 woods of the British islands. None of these is so 

 large as the green, and they are more broken in the 

 colours, hence they are called spotted woodpeckers, 

 and distinguished from each other by the spotted 

 " greater," " medium/' and " less ; " though the com- 

 paratives must be restricted to themselves, and not 

 in any way applied to the green one, though major, 

 mcdius, and minor, have been used as their specific 

 appellations. 



Greater Spotted Woodpecker (P. major '). This 

 species is about nine inches long, a foot in the 

 stretcli of the wings, and weighs but half as much as 

 the green one. The forehead, the sides of the head, 

 the scapulars, a patch on each side of the neck, some 

 of the wing coverts, the breast, the belly, and spots 

 on the wings, and the tail feathers, except the two 

 middle ones, are white. The occiput arid vent 

 feathers are dull greyish red, and all the rest of the 

 plumage black. The female has no red on the 

 head ; and the young males have the red before the 

 black on the head, while the mature males have them 

 placed the other way. This is a hardy and active 

 bird, residing more 'in cold situations, and in pine 

 forests, than the former species ; and as pines, from 

 the turpentine they contain, have rarely insects so 

 deep in the timber of them as deciduous trees have, 

 this bird is not quite so exclusively a woodpecker as 

 the other, but ranges more, and is more miscellaneous 

 in its feeding. At one season, however, the cambium 

 between the wood and the bark of the pine is re- 

 markably sweet, and liable to be very seriously 

 attacked by the larvse of beetles. It is the same 



