HOW TO KNOW A WOODPECKER 7 



of trees, they are not exclusively climbing birds. 

 Some kinds, like the flickers, are quite as fre- 

 quently found on the ground, wading in the 

 grass like meadowlarks. Often we may frighten 

 them from the tangled vines of the frost grape 

 and the branches of wild cherry trees, or from 

 clumps of poison-ivy, whither they come to eat 

 the fruit. The red-headed woodpecker is fond 

 of sitting on fence posts and telegraph poles; 

 and both he and the flicker frequently alight on 

 the roofs of barns and houses and go pecking 

 and pattering over the shingles. The sapsuckers 

 and several other kinds will perch on dead limbs, 

 like a flycatcher, on the watch for insects; the 

 flickers, and more rarely other kinds, will sit 

 crosswise of a limb instead of crouching length- 

 wise of it, as is the custom with woodpeckers. 



All these points you will soon learn. You 

 will become familiar with the form, the flight, 

 and the calls of the different woodpeckers ; you 

 will learn not only to know them by name, but 

 to understand their characters ; they will become 

 your acquaintances, and later on your friends. 



This heavy bird, with straight, chisel bill and 

 sharp-pointed tail-feathers ; with liis short legs 

 and wide, flapping wings, his unmusical but not 

 disagreeable voice, and his heavy, undulating, 

 business-like flight, is distinctly bourgeois, the 



