YOUNG SAPSUCKERS IN CAPTIVITY. 157 



to secure several living sapsuckers, to cut them 

 off as completely as might be practicable from 

 insect food, to feed them if possible upon con- 

 centrated maple sap, and to see whether a diet 

 of that kind would sustain life. It was possible 

 that they might refuse to eat anything, that they 

 might eat the offered food but die in a few days, 

 that they might live for a time but show distress 

 and inability to digest the food. On the other 

 hand it was possible that they might take kindly 

 to the diet, thrive upon maple syrup, and live for 

 weeks, perhaps months, in a manifestly healthy 

 condition. I had confidence enough in my pre- 

 vious observations to believe that the birds would 

 relish syrup, and would live upon it for a suffi- 

 ciently long time to induce those who still consid- 

 ered the birds insect eaters only, to admit that a 

 contrary presumption had been raised. 



It was first necessary to secure the birds. Hav- 

 ing failed, in 1890, to catch old birds by making 

 them tipsy, I decided to secure a nestf ul of young 

 birds before they took to the wing. Searching the 

 forest near Orchard No. 1, 1 found, on July 1, a 

 nest filled with noisy fledglings whose squealing 

 sounded afar in the otherwise silent woods. The 

 hole was on the south side of a living poplar, about 

 twenty feet from the ground. Two old holes 

 scarred the trunk. The parent birds came fre- 

 quently to the tree, and their arrival was always 



