HOW TO KNOW A WOODPECKER 



THE woodpecker is the easiest of all birds to 

 recognize. Even if entirely new to you, you may 

 readily decide whether a bird is a woodpecker or 

 not. 



The woodpecker is always striking and is 

 often gay in color. He is usually noisy, and his 

 note is clear and characteristic. His shape and 

 habits are peculiar, so that whenever you see a 

 bird clinging to the side of a tree " as if he had 

 been thrown at it and stuck/' you may safely 

 call him a woodpecker. Not that all birds which 

 cling to the bark of trees are woodpeckers, for 

 the chickadees, the crested titmice, the nut- 

 hatches, the brown creepers, and a few others 

 like the kinglets and some wrens and wood-war- 

 blers more or less habitually climb up and down 

 the tree-trunks; but these do it with a pretty 

 grace wholly unlike the woodpecker's awkward, 

 cling-fast way of holding on. As the largest of 

 these is smaller than the smallest woodpecker, 

 and as none of them (excepting only the tiny 



