Canadian Forestry Journal, June, 1917 1155 



The woodpecker is chief warden of our forests; our forests which mean 

 to us not only the wealth of a great lumber industry, but also our water 

 supply; our reserve of moisture for the long dry seasons; our daily conven- 

 iences, — but think this all out for yourselves; look about you and consider 

 how you would be inconvenienced by the loss of your daily wooden comforts. 



Our Government spends thousands of dollars each year; hundreds of 

 thousands for wardens and utilities for the protection of these grand trees 

 and their young growth, from destruction through the agency of man; but 

 the Great Captain gave the guardianship of these very necessary forests into 

 the keeping of this vast army of wardens, which we might call the Wood- 

 pecker battalions; of which there are three hundred and fifty; with sub- 

 divisions of companies in each battalion; commonly spoken of as "varieties." 



Just note, in your camping weeks and forest jaunts, the many sorts of 

 "Flickers," of Pileates; and "Sapsuckers."* 



Note the difTering numbers of toes; and the wonderful tail common to 

 all, w^hich acts as a prop and support against the branchless, perpendicular 

 tree from which the little warden is extracting the destructive grub or beetle. 



The Woodpecker Wardens 



Very, very busy are the Woodpecker wardens; for we must remember 

 that the wood-boring beetles alone, are an army opposed to man and his 

 forests; and they outnumber the Woodpeckers in thousands against one; yet 

 the beetles are, again, only one of many insect armies, kept in subjection by 

 the valued woodpeckers. 



Of course, w^e must not overlook the kind services of the skunk, the coon, 

 the owl and the snake, who are, in a manner, the pickets or outposts; and 

 gather in many hundreds of thousands of the enemy while they are in the 

 beetle stage. But while all this helps, and greatly too, yet, alone it would 

 prove inadequate; for the eggs and larvae of these enemies are so very num- 

 erous, that they supply two-thirds of all the food for these numerous wood- 

 pecker families, with their three hundred and fifty known branches, and hun- 

 dreds of subdivisions. 



It has been claimed that the woodpecker often cuts into a tree deeply 

 and cruelly. So he does. But the death to that tree was lying curled securely 

 at the end of the woodpeckers deeply cut tunnel; and, permitted to complete 

 its stages of existence, would carry death to hundreds of other, otherwise, 

 healthy trees. 



Not only does woodpecker seek diligently for the great yellowy-white 

 larvae, but he also gathers most industriously, by millions, the tiny eggs 

 which he is enabled to discover through the wonderful lenses God gave for 

 this purpose, in the gift of microscopic eyes. 



The woodpecker, while denied the gift of song, is yet a lover of music? 

 Only the male bird, in the wooing season, tries, through the agency of instru- 

 mental music, to atone for the vocal lack, imposed by nature? This is true. 

 The long, rolling tattoo, so often heard in early summer, or spring, made by 

 the iron-like beak of the woodpecker, in rapid vibration against a resonant 

 dead tree or tall stump, is his music; his love call; his lure to his mate. So 

 far as I have been able to note, this is his only recreation; this little half hour 

 or so of music; indulged in for the wooing and for the entertainment of the 

 mate as she sits on the nine white eggs, deep in the heart of some old hollow 

 stump; — a well earned interval from the more materialistic duties of securing 

 grubs from some afflicted tree, with which to feed his loved one. 



I one day watched a woodpecker as he trolled out his love notes from a 

 tall steel tower near my open window. It may have seemed a soothing note 

 to the nest-tied wife of the musician, who spent just four bright, sunny hours 



*As to the value of the "yellow-bellied sapsucker," Dr. Gordon Hewitt, Dominion Ento- 

 mologist, pointed out in the May Forestry Journal that this variety is the only one of the wood- 

 pecker family that commonly attacks healthy trees. 



