The Red-headed Woodpecker 87 
in some localities that, like the gray squirrels, the birds are common in good 
beechnut winters and absent in others. Cold and snow do not trouble them, if 
they have plenty to eat, for, as Major Bendire says, many of them “winter along 
our northern border, in certain years, when they can find an abundant supply of 
food.”’ In fact, in the greater part of the eastern states the-Redhead is “a rather 
regular resident,”’ but in the western part of its range “it appears to migrate 
pretty regularly,” so that it is rare to see one “north of latitude 40°, in winter.” 
The western boundary of the Redhead’s range is the Rocky Mountains, but 
east of the mountains it breeds from Manitoba and northern New York south 
to the Gulf of Mexico; though it is a rare bird in eastern New England. 
In sections where this erratic Woodpecker migrates, it leaves 
Migration its nesting-grounds early in October, and returns the latter part 
of April or the beginning of May. Before too much taken up with 
the serious business of life, the Redhead goes gaily about, as Major Bendire 
says, “frolicking and playing hide-and-seek with its mate, and when not so 
engaged, amusing itself by drumming on some resonant dead I mb, or on the 
roof and sides of houses, barns, etc.’’ For, though like other drummers, the Wood- 
peckers are not found in the front ranks of the orchestra, they beat a royal tattoo 
that may well express many fine feelings. 
When the musical spring holiday is over and the birds have chosen a tree 
for the nest, they hew out a pocket in a trunk or branch, anywhere from eight 
to eighty feet from the ground. When the young hatch, there comes a happy 
day for the looker-on who, by kind intent and unobtrusive way, has earned the 
right to watch the lovely birds flying back and forth, caring for their brood. 
And then, at last, come the days when the gray-headed young- 
Nest sters, from hanging out of the window, boldly open their wings 
and launch into the air. Anxious times these are for old birds,— 
times when the watcher’s admiration may be roused by heroic deeds of parental 
love; for many a parent bird fairly flaunts in the face of the enemy, as if trying 
to say, “Kill me; spare my young!” 
One family of Redheads once gave me a delightful three weeks. When 
the old birds were first discovered, one was on a stub ina meadow. When 
joined by its mate,as the farmer was coming with oxen and hayrack to take up 
the rows of haycocks that led down the field, the pair flew slowly ahead along a 
line of locusts, pecking quietly at the bark of each tree before flying on. At 
the foot of the meadow they flew over to a small grove in the adjoining pasture. 
As it was July, it was easy to draw conclusions. And when I went to the 
grove to investigate, the pair were so much alarmed that they at once corrob- 
orated my conclusions. Did I mean harm? Why had I come? One of them 
leaned far down across a dead limb and inspected me, rattling and bowing 
nervously; the other stationed itself on the back of a branch over which it peered 
_ at me with one eye. Both of them cried krii/-tar-rah every time I ventured to 
take a step. As they positively would not commit themselves as to which one 
