24 BIRDS OF CALIFORNIA AFFECTING FRUIT INDUSTRY. 
the pulp of the larger cultivated varieties, though that in the stomachs 
taken in winter could have had no economic value. Seeds of the 
elderberry (Sambucus) were found in two stomachs. The largest 
amounts of fruit were eaten in August and September, when they 
reached 59.34 and 54 percent, respectively. While this is a high per- 
centage of fruit, it is not believed that the bird does any sensible 
damage in the orchard, since it is not numerous enough and does not 
usually frequent cultivated ground. No complaints of such damage 
have yet been heard. 
The principal item of food of the California woodpecker is acorns. 
Acorns form 52.45 percent of the year’s food, and were found in every 
month when stomachs were taken except August; as only three were 
collected in that month, the record is not very reliable. In Novem- 
ber, when 12 stomachs were taken, mast amounted to nearly 93.58 
percent of the average contents. In 12 stomachs collected in June, 
when fruit and insects are abundant, it averaged 79.25 percent. In 
July it fell to 29.47 percent, the deficiency of acorns being made up 
by animal food, which attains the highest percentage in that month. 
The question has been raised whether the woodpecker stores acorns 
for the sake of the meat, or for the grubs that frequently develop 
therein. Stomach examination shows that, while the substance of 
the acorn is eaten freely whenever obtainable, larve are almost 
entirely wanting. It is therefore the nuts themselves that the 
woodpecker stores for food. From an economic point of view little 
objection to this acorn-eating habit can be raised. The acorn crop 
is usually superabundant, and in most cases can not be put to better 
use than to tide the woodpeckers over the winter until insects become 
plentiful. 
SUMMARY. 
From the foregoing discussion of the food of the California wood- 
pecker it is obvious that the bird’s food does not possess high eco- 
nomic value. On the other hand the bird can not be charged with 
the destruction of useful insects or of any product of husbandry. 
While it eats some fruit, it does not habitually infest orchards, and 
is seldom numerous enough to be a serious nuisance. The few insects 
it eats are nearly all harmful. 
The trees used by the bird for storehouses are usually dead or partly 
so, and in living trees the punctures do not go through the bark, so that 
no harm is done. When holes are drilled in buildings, fences, or tele- 
graph poles, theinjury is real, but on the whole the damage done in 
this way is not extensive. 
When the beneficial and injurious habits of the bird are carefully 
weighed, the balance is decidedly in the bird’s favor; and from the 
esthetic standpoint few birds are more interesting and beautiful. 
