1912] Swarth: Birds and Mammals from Vancouver Island 35 



the female parent were secured (nos. 15671-15673) ; the male 

 was not seen at any time. The only other occasion on which the 

 species was seen was at Errington, September 26, when one was 

 shot in a cherry tree near our tent. This bird (no. 15674) is an 

 immature female in first winter plumage, with a few Juvenal 

 feathers still lingering on the breast. 



I searched carefully for the species at Nootka Sound, but 

 failed to find it, though there were old sapsucker workings on 

 trees in the woods. None of this work was at all fresh, and as 

 the perforations are visible for years after they are made, they 

 are of little assistance in determining the abundance of the bird. 

 Old workings were seen at other points mi the island also, at 

 Great Central Lake, Golden Eagle Basin, and at Errington. 



The Vancouver Island birds, as represented by the four speci- 

 mens at hand, belong to the northern race of the red-breasted 

 sapsucker. though they are not quite as deeply colored ;is are 

 Alaskan birds. The color characters of the race are as strongly 

 marked in the two young birds as in the adults. Compared with 

 juvenals of daggetti from California the two young ones from 

 Beaver Creek are much darker toned throughout, being decidedly 

 sooty in appearance. One has the back almost uniformly black, 

 there being only one or two tiny Hecks of white, nearly hidden 

 in the black feathers. 



According to prevailing usage the name ruber is applied to 

 the southern race of this sapsucker, but I think that the facts 

 fully warrant its restriction to the northern subspecies. I'iins 

 ruber of Gmelin (17SS, p. 429) was based on Latham's (1782, 

 pp. 562, 563) description of the Red-breasted Woodpecker. I am 

 indebted to Dr. C. W. Richmond for a manuscript copy of this 

 description. Tt reads as follows: 



"Somewhat less than the last. The bill is an inch long, and of a 

 brownish horn-color: the head, neck, and breast, crimson: from each 

 nostril is a line of buff, passing under the eye, where it finishes: the 

 back part of the neck mixed with dusky: back and wings black: several 

 of the lesser wing coverts, near the outside of the wing, are tipped with 

 white, and others of the greater coverts have the outer webs white, mak- 

 ing a streak of this color parallel to and near the edge of the wing: must 

 of the scapulars marked with an obscure yellowish spot at the tip: lie 

 first quill feather black, marked on the inner web half way from the base 



