Notes on the White-breasted Nuthatch^ 



William T. Davis 



Last summer Mr. Isaac Wort, of Woodrow, Staten Island, 

 showed Mr. Howard H. Cleaves and me a small sour gum hav- 

 ing a hole in the trunk about 30 ft. from the ground, where a 

 pair of white-breasted nuthatches, Sitta carolinensis Lath,, had 

 their nest earlier in the season. This is the first record of the 

 bird breeding on our island. 



We have seen a white-breasted nuthatch in the Clove Valley on 

 the tenth of August, but most of the records are from September 

 I to the end of March. We have found the bird in the wooded 

 portions of Bronx Park, N. Y. City, on June 19, and it is com- 

 monly considered a permanent resident in this vicinity. 



Alexander Wilson says that the nuthatches have received the 

 name from their " supposed practice of breaking nuts by repeated 

 hatchings, or hammerings with their bills," but he adds that he 

 has never seen them so engaged, and concludes that if they do 

 open soft-shelled nuts, they are after the larvae that so often 

 breed therein. However, that they are fond of the kernels of 

 nuts has been attested many times since the days of Wilson. 



On a cold day late in November several years ago, I noticed a 

 white-breasted nuthatch picking at a nut that it had laid on a 

 large fungus growth up in a tree, using the fungus as a table. I 

 stopped to watch it, and the nuthatch also stopped to look at 

 me. After going on with its work, it again regarded me for a 

 short time, then went into a hole, and presently reappeared with 

 a nut. This it placed beside the other one. It would pick at 

 these nuts, or would run up the tree a little way, and then back 

 as if for exercise, but always returning to the nuts. I had 

 watched it for a long time, when coming around to the hole again, 



^Presented October 16, 1909. 



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