CLIMBING WOOD-HEWER 235 
arched gallery, neatly made of slender sticks resting 
along a horizontal branch, and about fourteen inches 
long. This peculiar entrance no doubt prevents the 
intrusion of snakes and small mammals. The struc- 
ture differs from all the domed nests of other species 
of Woodhewers in the spaciousness of the cavity 
where the eggs are laid. The dome removed, an eagle 
or vulture could breed in it quite comfortably. So 
strongly made is the nest that I have stood on the 
dome of one and stamped on it with my heavy boots 
without injuring it in the least, and to demolish one 
I had to force my gun barrel into it, then prize it up 
by portions. I examined about a dozen of these 
enormous structures, but they were all met with 
before or after the laying season, so that I did not 
see the eggs. 
CLIMBING WOOD-HEWER 
Picolaptes angustirostris 
Above, head and neck blackish, with oblong whitish shaft-spots on 
the crown and neck; broad superciliaries white, extending nearly to 
the back and broken at their lower ends into shaft-spots; rest of 
upper surface dull brown, brighter on the rump; wing-feathers pale 
obscure chestnut; outer webs and broad tips of primaries blackish ; 
tail chestnut; sides of breast and belly thickly marked with faint 
blackish stripes ; under wing-coverts cinnamon ; length 8.2 inches. 
THis is the only member of the genus Picolaptes as 
yet met with within the limits of the Argentine 
Republic. Azara found it abundant in Paraguay, 
