Widmann — A Preliminary Catalog of the Birds of Missouri. 127 



as we go from the Missouri River northward, and from fairly 

 common to common as we go southward. Like the Redhead 

 it winters even in places which afford little food and shelter 

 but extends its daily forage to distant feeding grounds. A 

 Flicker which roosted all winter in one of our bird boxes, left it 

 early in the morning, flying straight south as far as the eye 

 could follow. It was never seen during the day but came back 

 to its box every evening before dark. The month of March is 

 the time set for the return of the Flicker to Missouri, but since 

 the inconstancy of March weather is proverbial, it is not surpris- 

 ing to find that this event may take place just as well in the first 

 as in the second, third or fourth week of the month, the records 

 of a long series of years being thus evenly distributed. Large 

 troops of transient visitants, often in company with Robins, pass 

 through between the middle of March and latter part of April, 

 sometimes spending a week or more at the same place awaiting 

 the desired change in the weather. Extended wandering is done 

 at night but local movements are sometimes noticed in daytime. 

 March 23, 1895, I counted one hundred Flickers in as many 

 minutes all following the same route along the bluffs at Creve 

 Coeur Lake, St. Louis Co., in a northeasterly direction. Being 

 very sociable, congenial fellows, they gather in flocks very early 

 in autumn. On favorite grounds troops may be met with in 

 August, largely increased by transients in September, but toward 

 the end of the month a sudden decrease is noticeable and by the 

 first of October many of their haunts are deserted and their 

 occurrence slowly approaches the state which we see in winter, 

 though the advent of real winter may yet induce many of the 

 less brave to depart for a milder clime at the last moment. 



413. Colaptes cafer collaris (Vigors). Red-shafted Flicker. 



Colaptes mexicanus. Colaptes collaris. Picas mexicanus. Colaptes ayresii 

 (Aud.). Colaptes cafer. Colaptes hybridus. 



Geog. Dist. — Western North America from British Columbia 

 south to Mexico; east to eastern Nebraska and central Kansas; 

 west to the coast ranges of Oregon and Washington and to the 

 Pacific coast from northern California to Lower California. 

 Hybrid forms are found wherever the two species meet from 

 Alberta and Assiniboia southward over the Plains and in mi- 

 gration as far eastward as western Missouri. 



Mr. B. F. Bush of Courtney, Mo., writes: "I shot several 



