326 GEOLOGICAL SURVEY OF CANADA. 
This is a rare species on the margin of the prairie as only two were 
seen at Indian Head in the spring of 1892, and one at Medicine Hat 
in 1894; a tolerably common resident at Edmonton, Alta.; a few 
observed along the trail between Lesser Slave lake and Peace River 
Landing, Atha.; not uncommon in the foothills from Calgary south 
to Crow Nest pass in the Rocky mountains; observed about a dozen 
in the month of April, 1903 at Penticton, B.C.; common at Agassiz 
and Burrard inlet, B.C., in May, 1889. (Spreadborough.) Common 
at Grand Rapids on the Saskatchewan. (Nutting.) This species 
exists as far north as lat. 63°. It remains all the year in the North- 
west Territories and is the commonest species up to the fifty-sixth 
parallel, north of which it yields in frequency to the three-toed 
species. (Richardson.) North to Fort Simpson, on the Mackenzie 
river; common. (Ross.) Common throughout the interior of 
British Columbia; breeds. (Streator.) East of the Coast range, 
B.C.; a common resident. (F/annin.) A common species in 
winter at Lake Okanagan, B.C.; tolerably common in the Cariboo 
district; I have taken this form several times in the lower Fraser 
valley. Common at Quesnel, Cariboo district, B.C., in 1901. 
(Brooks.) In a series of eight skins from British Columbia, one, a 
young female, lacks the white spotting on the wing coverts char- 
acteristic of lJeucomelas. (Rhoads.) This form, if it reaches’ the 
coast of Bering sea at all, reaches it by way of the Northwest Ter- 
ritories. The specimen in my collection was taken at Fort Reliance, 
on the upper Yukon, about Lat. 66°, and undoubtedly the bird 
straggles still further to the north. (Nelson.) An occasional in- 
dividual of this species was seen in the timber belt, Kenai moun- 
tains, Alaska, but it was not common at any point visited. (Fzggins.) 
Osgood took a single specimen on Fifty-mile river a few miles above 
Miles canyon, Yukon. (Brshop.) 
Some of the western references mentioned above doubtless belong 
to hyloscopus. 
BREEDING NoTes.—On June 11th, 1883, while in the spruce 
bush I heard a curious chirping sound that scarcely ever seemed 
to cease. I traced it to a small poplar tree, in whose trunk was 
a hole about 30 feet from the ground. Having procured an axe 
I soon had the tree down and found myself in possession of a nest 
of young hairy woodpeckers. They were in a hole, evidently the 
work of the parent birds, about a foot deep, 3 inches wide inside 
