338 UI8TORY OF THE 



is undulating, and its habits in many respects like the Red- 

 headed, but it is not so much of an upland bird, or lover of 

 berries and fruits, and therefore more respected by the farmer. 

 Their nests are excavated in stubs and decaying trunks and 

 branches of trees, ranging from fifteen to forty feet from the 

 ground. Eggs four or five, occasionally six. A set of five 

 eggs, collected April 14th, 1878. at Neosho Falls, Kansas, 

 measure: l.OOx.70, l.OOx.71, 1.02x.71, 1.02x.74; pure trans- 

 parent white, the air sac or circular spot at larger end chalky 

 white; in form, rather elliptical to oblong oval. They were 

 taken from a nest in the trunk of a small, leaning walnut tree, 

 about thirty feet from the ground; entrance on the under side, a 

 round hole just large enough to admit the birds, enlarged below 

 from four to five inches, and twelve inches in depth; a very 

 roomy nest, no lining; eggs laid on the soft, rotten wood. 



GENUS COLAPTES SWAINSON. 



"Bill slender, depressed at the base, then compressed. Culmen much curved 

 gonys straight; both with acute ridges, and coming to quite a sharp point with 

 the commissure at the 'end; the bill consequently riot truncate at the end. No 

 ridges on the bill. Nostrils basal, median, oval and exposed. Gonys very short, 

 about half the culmen. Feet large; the anterior outer toe considerably longer 

 than the posterior. Tail long, exceeding the secondaries; the feathers suddenly 

 acuminate, with elongated points." 



Colaptes auratus (LINN.). 



FLICKER. 

 PLATE XXII. 



Resident; common. Begin laying the last of ApriL 



B. 97. R. 378. C. 457. G. 174, 160. U. 412. 



HABITAT. Eastern North America; north to Hudson's Bay; 

 west to the eastern slope of the Rocky Mountains; also reported 

 from Alaska, where we would only naturally look for the North- 

 western Flicker. 



SP. CHAB. "Shafts and under surfaces of wing and tail feathers gamboge 

 yellow. Male: With a black patch on each side of the cheek. A red crescent 

 on the nape. Throat and stripe beneath the eye pale lilac brown. Back glossed 

 with olivaceous green. Female: Without the black cheek patch. 



ADDITIONAL CHARACTERS. "A crescentic patch on the breast, and rounded 

 spots 011 the belly, black. Back and wing coverts with interrupted transverse 



