GOLDEN- WINGED WOODPECKER. 401 



Abundant summer resident from April to October. A few remain in 

 Middle Ohio throughout the year. 



This in the most abundant and best known of all our Woodpeckers. 

 It frequents forests and groves, orchards and solitary trees in fields. 

 With the ordinary food habits of Woodpeckers, it combines a taste for 

 grasshoppers and beetles, and is moreover an expert iiycatcher, often 

 capturing insects on the wing after the manner of the true Flycatchers. 

 It is more often seen seeking food on the ground than any other of the 

 family, except the Golden-winged Woodpecker. Nor is its food entirely 

 insectivous, for, as farmers and gardeners well know, it invades gar- 

 dens and orchards, eating, carrying off and mutilating the finest apples, 

 pears, cherries, and other fruits. It also visits the corn-fields and feeds 

 upon the tender corn and the worms which attack it. 



In this vicinity only a few remain through the winter, and these retire 

 to the deepest woods or wooded ravines, where they find a limited pro- 

 tection from the severity of the weather. About the middle of April 

 they return in great numbers from the south, and leave again in Septem- 

 ber and Ootober. 



They are very noisy and quarrelsome, not only among each other, but 

 frequently with other birds. Should a bird of another species be in- 

 clined to resent their impertinent assault, they retire to a dead limb or 

 fence stake, and treat their irritated enemy to an aggravating game of 

 bo-peep. 



The nest of the Red-headed Woodpecker varies greatly in position, 

 being located from ten to a hundred feet above the ground. It is gen- 

 erally in a dead limb or trunk, but not unfrequently excavated in living 

 wood. The eggs are usually five, pure white, and measure from 1.10 to 

 1.16 inches in length by .80 to .90 in breadth. 



Genus C0LAPTE3. Swainson. 



Bill cnrved, pointed, withoDt lidge on upper mandible. Nostrils oral. Fosteiior onti 

 toe shorter than the anterior. 



CoLAPTKS AURATUS (L.) Sw. 

 Gi-old.ea-'winged "Woodpeclrer; Fliclier. 



Pioui auratus, Eirtland, Ohio Oeolog. Sarv., 1838, 162. 



Colaptes auratua, Read, Proo Phila. Acad. Nat. Soi., vi, 1853, 395. — Kirkpatrick, Ohio 

 Farmer, ix, 1860, 347.— Wheaton, Ohio Agric. Eep. for 1860, 362, 373 s Reprint, 1861, 

 4, 15; Food of Birds, etc., Ohio Agrio. Eep. for lb74, 569; Reprint, 1875, 9.— Langdoi^ 

 Cat. Birds of Cin., 1877, 11 ; Journ. Cin. Soo. Nat. Hist., i, 1879, 179 ; Reprint, 13 

 Summer Birds, ib., ill, 1880, 225 ; Field Notes, ib., ii, 1880, 125. 



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