ig. Indian Museum Notes. [Vol. IV. 



grasshoppers. One of them, which had its head-quarters near my house, was 

 observed making frequent visits to an old oak post, and on examining it 1 found a 

 large crack where the woodpecker had inserted about lOO grasshoppers of all sizes 

 (for future use, as later observation proved), which were put in without killing them, 

 but they were so firmly wedged in the crack that they in vain tried to get free. I 

 told this to a couple of farmers, and found that they had also seen the same thing, 

 and showed me posts which were used for the same purpose. Later in the season 

 the woodpecker whose station was near my house, commenced to use his stores 

 and to-day (February lo), there are only a few shrivelled-up grasshoppers left. 



Mr. Charles Aldrich, of Webster City, Iowa, states that he saw a 

 Red-headed Woodpecker catching grasshoppers on the prairie half a 

 mile from timber. In Nebraska grasshoppers were found in four out 

 of six stomachs examined by Prof. Samuel Aughey. 



Besides depredations upon fruit and grain, this woodpecker has 

 been accused of destroying the eggs of other birds and even of 

 killing the young ; and from Florida comes a report that it enters 

 poultry houses and sucks the eggs of domestic fowls. Mr. Charles 

 Aldrich, of Webster City, Iowa, says that a Red-headed Wood- 

 pecker was seen to kill a duckling with a single blow on the heady 

 and then to peck out and eat the brains.^ In view of such testimony 

 remains of eggs and young birds were carefully looked for in the 

 stomachs examined, but pieces of egg-shell were found in only one 

 stomach of the Flicker and two of the Red-head. 



A very unusual trait has been recorded by Dr. Howard Jones, of 

 Circleville, Ohio. Dr. Jones says he has seen the Red-headed Wood- 

 pecker steal the eggs of eave swallows, and in cases where the necks 

 of the nests were so long that the eggs were out of reach, the wood- 

 pecker made a hole in the walls of the nest and so obtained the 

 contents. In a colony of swallows containing "dozens " of nests, not 

 a single brood of young was raised. One of the woodpeckers also 

 began to prey upon hen's eggs, and was finally captured in the act 

 of robbing the nest of a sitting hen.^ 



No traces of young birds or of any other vertebrates were dis- 

 covered in the stomachs of any of the seven species under consider- 

 ation, except bones of a small frog which were found in the stomach 

 of a Red-bellied Woodpecker {Melanerpes caroliniis) from Florida. 



The Red-head has been accused of doing considerable damage to 

 fruit and grain, and both charges are fairly well sustained. In 

 Northern New York, Dr. Merriam has seen it peck into apples on the 

 tree, and has several times seen it feed on choke cherries {Primus 

 •virginiana), 



Mr. August Jahn, of Poke County, Ark., writes that it has 

 damaged his corn to the amount of $io or $15. and Dr. J. R. Mathers, 



1 Am. Nat. Volume Vl, No. 5, May 1S77, page 308. 



' Ornith. and Oologist, Volume VIH, No. 7, 1SS3, page 56. 



