66 



THE OOLOGIST 



ited all forests. But with the vanish- 

 ing of more cherished game, hunters 

 began to persecute our great wood- 

 pecker, shooting the birds at every op- 

 portunity and leaving them as food for 

 insects. As the country became more 

 populated, the forests, necessarily, be- 

 came smaller and smaller until the 

 Indian Hen was compelled to seek 

 refuge in the lesser timber tracts. 

 Here, of course, their destruction was 

 sure; for squirrel hunters, particularly 

 slew each bird on account of its size 

 and attractive coloration. 



So, today, we find the pileated wood- 

 pecker driven by ruthless man, their 

 greatest enemy, into the wilder and 

 less frequented mountain slashings, 

 primeval forests, or wooded tracts re- 

 moved from the habitations of man. 

 It is true that in some regions, where 

 the birds are not molested, they will 

 resort to woods quite near the dwell- 

 ings of men. 



This giant woodpecker has been di- 

 videdby scientists into two geographi- 

 cal races, the Pileated Woodpecker. 

 Phloeotomus pileatus pileatus, and the 

 the Northern Pileated Woodpecker, 

 Phloeotomus pileatus abieticola. The 

 Northerner is said to be of a larger 

 size than the species found farther 

 south. It ranges from the southern 

 Alleghany Mountains into the central 

 parts of the Dominion of Canada; while 

 the true Pileated ranges throughout 

 the Southern States. The species are 

 similar in habits. They flit about the 

 darker forests, feeding extensively 

 upon large ants, beetles, and larvae, 

 thus ridding the trees of quite noxious 

 insect pests. Undoubtedly the birds 

 are valuable to the forests. 



For nesting places these birds usual- 

 ly select some dead, or partly dead, 

 snag, hidden away in the deeper re- 

 cesses of a forest or slashing. In this 

 snag they excavate a cavity to a depth 

 of from fifteen to twenty inches, en- 



larging it as they dig downwards. Up- 

 on soft chips of wood they deposit 

 from three to five pure white and 

 glassy eggs. Early May is the usual 

 time for completed sets in the North, 

 while in the South the middle of April 

 is the time for a full clutch. A nest 

 found by the writer on May 8, 1913, 

 in Central Pennsylvania, was dug into 

 a somewhat leaning red maple (Acer 

 rubrum) snag which was secluded in 

 a dense and wet timber slashing, deep 

 down in a mountain valley. It was 

 thirty feet above the ground and about 

 seven feet below the top of the snag. 

 The entrance hole faced the East. The 

 bird was at-home on four fresh eggs 

 which appeared very beautiful, their 

 intensely yellowish yolks giving them 

 an attractive tinge of color. The eggs 

 measured 1.30 x .99, 1.35 x .97, 1.27 x .96, 

 1.28 X. 96. 



For several years past I knew that 

 the pileated woodpecker regularly in- 

 habited some of the larger and more 

 secluded woods of southwestern Penn- 

 sylvania. Mr. J. Warren Jacobs had 

 found them nesting many years ago. 

 On May 22, 1904, I saw my first pileat- 

 ed woodpecker. It was picking at the 

 dead part of an apple tree that stood 

 in an orchard bordering an extensive 

 woods of huge oak, ash, and tulip 

 trees. I felt sure that a pair of tlij 

 birds nested there each season ani 

 was assured of it when my friend, M \ 

 James Carter, noted in early Juna. 

 1906, an adult bird accompanied b/ 

 three well grown young. They crept 

 up the side of a giant white ash tree 

 and Mr. Carter watched them a short 

 time. I made several searches for a 

 nest with the result that I found a di- 

 lapidated excavation, 10 feet up, in tlie 

 top of a sugar maple snag that stood 

 on a steep hillside. The excavation 

 was not a deep one, being probably 8 

 or 9 inches. Since the preceding 

 notes I have had no signs of the birds 



