PICI. 115 
nest, and until the first frosts give warning of the coming 
winter. It reaches southern Ohio about the 25th of April, 
and the northern counties within three days afterward. 
Frequently a few individuals remain all winter even at the 
lake shore, but the majority have left the northern regions 
before the last of September. 
The Red-head is not quite a true woodpecker, since he 
does not search the bark of trees for insects and worms as 
mutch as he looks for them on posts and such surfaces, but 
he has developed the flycatcher habit of darting out for fly- 
ing insects, catching them as adroitly as any Kingbird. The 
late General J. D. Cox told with evident relish how as a boy 
he took advantage of this flycatching habit to catch the bird. 
By tossing a small stone up past the bird alert upon the top 
of some broken topped dead tree, as the stone fell downward 
the bird would invariably dart out to catch it, but was 
stunned and fluttered to the ground only to be pounced 
upon and carried off in triumph by the young general! 
“The Red-head makes the best showing in the kinds of 
insects eaten. It consumes fewer ants and more beetles than 
any of the other species, in this respect standing at the head, 
and it has a pronounced taste for beetles of very large size. 
Unfortunately, however, its fondness for predaceous beetles 
must be reckoned against it. It also leads in the consumption 
of grasshoppers ; these and beetles together forming 36 per 
cent. of its whole food.” (Beal.) It also eats a little corn, 
a good deal of wild and cultivated fruit, and beech-nuts. It 
does not injure trees by pecking them. The nest is dug out 
of almost any woody substance, preferably a tree, but fre- 
quently a post will do as well. 
156. (409.) CentTuRUS cAROLINUS (Linn.). 145. 
Red-bellied Woodpecker. 
Synonyms: Melanerpes carolinus, Picus carolinus. 
Zebra Bird, Guinea Woodpecker, Carolina Woodpecker, 
Checkered Woodpecker, Zebra Woodpecker, Orange 
Woodpecker or Sapsucker. 
Wilson, Am. Orn., I, 1808, 113. 
The Red-bellied Woodpecker is fairly common in the 
