No. 3.] Reprints and Miscellaneous Notes, 163 



He says : "Gray squirrels, Red-headed Woodpeckers, and beech-nuts 

 were numerous during the winters of 1871-72, 1873-74, 1875-76, 

 1877-78, 1879-80, 1881-82, 1883-84, while during the alternate years 

 the squirrels and nuts were scarce and the woodpeckers altogether 

 absent ;" and adds that in Lewis Country, New York, " a good squirrel 

 year is synonymous with a good year for Melanerpes, and vice versa." 

 In early spring, following nut years, when the melting snow un- 

 covers the ground, they feed on the beech-nuts that were buried 

 during winter. On April 5, 1878, at Locust Grove, New York, he 

 shot six whose gizzards contained beech-nuts and nothing else. 



In an interesting article in the Auk\ Mr. O. P. Hay says that in 

 Central Indiana during a good beech-nut year, from the time the nuts 

 began to ripen, the Red-heads were almost constantly on the wing, 

 passing from the beeches to some place of deposit. They hid the 

 nuts in almost every conceivable situation. Many were placed in 

 cavities in partly decayed trees, and the felling of an old beech was 

 certain to provide a feast for the children. Large handfuls were 

 taken from a single knot hole. They were often found under a patch 

 of raised bark, and single nuts were driven into cracks in the bark. 

 Others were thrust into cracks in gate-posts ; and a favorite place 

 of deposit was behind long slivers on fence-posts. In a few cases 

 grains of corn were mixed with beech-nuts. Nuts were often driven 

 into cracks in the ends of railroad ties ; and the birds were often 

 seen on the roofs of houses pounding nuts into the crevices between 

 the shingles. In several instances the space formed by a board 

 springing away from a fence was nearly filled with nuts, and after- 

 wards pieces of bark and wood were brought and driven over the nuts 

 as if to hide them from poachers. 



In summer Dr. Merriam has seen the Red-heads '* make frequent 

 sallies into the air after passing insects, which were almost invariably 

 secured.^' He has also seen them catch grasshoppers on the ground 

 in a pasture. 



Dr. A. R. Fisher saw several Red-headed Wood-peckers feeding 

 on grasshoppers in the streets at Miles City, Mont., in the latter part 

 of July 1893. Several of the birds were seen capturing these insects 

 near the hotel throughout the greater part of the forenoon. From a 

 regular perch on top of a telegraph pole or cottonwood they de- 

 scended on their prey, sometimes eating them on the ground, but 

 more often returned to their former post to devour them. The fol- 

 lowing interesting observation was made by Dr. G. S. Agersborg, of 

 Vermillion, S, Dak^ : — 



Last spring in opening a good many birds of this species with the object of 

 ascertaining their principal food, I found in their stomachs nothing but young 



1 Auk. Volume IV, 1887, pages 194, 195. 



> BuU-Nuttall Ornith. Club, Volume 111, 1887, page 97. 



