FROM SPRING TO FALL. 



fix on a site for a nest, if the hole made in a 

 tree by the bill of the birds can be called one. 



If we examine the old nesting tunnel and the 

 new one, in the same tree, we find circular holes, 

 just large enough for the body of the bird, gouged 

 out under a projecting limb. When the old nest 

 gets foul, they set to work to make a fresh one. 

 This matter is not settled in a hurry: for weeks 

 the pair will look round in a general way, playing 

 antics with each other, making the wood or copse 

 ring with their yikeing laughs. As the ordinary 

 woodland songsters have not yet tried their voices 

 beyond half-hearted twiddles and pipings, the green 

 woodpeckers have it pretty much to themselves, 

 and they make the part of the wood or the timber 

 trees they have selected ring again. It is a difficult 

 matter to find out the exact tree they are at work on 

 when they are fairly at their carpentering, for the 

 birds take turn and turn about at the tunnelling 

 business, and when one is at work the other is on 

 the watch, looking down on you as you creep 

 through the under- stuff. As a rule, some lucky 

 accident enables you to determine on the exact 

 spot : to your very great astonishment you find 



