14 LLOYD'S NATURAL HISTORY. 



Ob. Mr. Hargitt considers that specimens from the Ussuri 

 River in Eastern Siberia, and from the island of Yezo, cannot 

 be separated from D. miner, though he admits that individuals 

 from the last-named locality are not typical. The same 

 authority states that from the Southern Urals, " across Siberia 

 north of about 55 N. lat. into Kamtchatka and Bering 

 Island," the place of D. minor is taken by D. pipra, a species 

 which differs from D. minor in being purer white below and 

 in having scarcely any streaks or spots on the under tail- 

 coverts, while the black bars on the lower back and rump 

 are scarcely discernible. In the Caucasus another species, 

 D. quadrifasciatus, replaces D. minor. Little is known of this 

 species, which is said to show only four, instead of five, white 

 bars on the wing, when the latter is closed. A very distinct 

 form, D. danfordi, is found in Asia Minor, easily recog- 

 nised by the black line of the moustache being directed 

 upwards behind the ear-coverts and joining the black of the 

 occiput. 



Habits This species is more often to be observed, at least 

 in the south of England, than any of the three English Wood- 

 peckers, and it differs a good deal in its habits from the Great 

 Spotted Woodpecker. In flight, as in size, it much more re- 

 sembles the Nuthatch, and its note is a sort of compromise 

 between that of the latter species and that of a Wryneck. 

 In fact its cry, when heard in winter, is somewhat startling 

 from its similarity to the Wryneck's call, until one remembers 

 that the last-named bird is far away in the south, and that 

 the oft-repeated note can only be that of the Lesser Spotted 

 Woodpecker. It certainly descends more often to the lower 

 branches of the big trees than does D. major, and is not 

 unfrequently seen hanging under a bough or climbing up the 

 smaller twigs of a large elrn or poplar. Its nest has also been 

 found at low elevations, but as far as my own experience goes, 

 the nest is a difficult one to obtain, and near Cookham in 

 Berkshire, where the bird is by no means uncommon, the nest 

 is exceptionally difficult to reach, as it is usually placed in a 

 high and rotten branch of a poplar tree. At times it descends 

 to the orchards, and the late Mr. John Henry Gurney told me 

 of a pair which frequented the orchard in a house where he 



