320 GEOLOGICAL SURVEY OF CANADA. 



then as the ants come swarming out he dispatches them till his 

 appetite is satisfied. Afterwards he comes again and again to the 

 hill till it is completely depopulated. {Thompson- Seton.) I 

 found a nest of this woodpecker, June 8th, 1882, at Bedford, Que., 

 in the trunk of an old beech tree, containing two younglings, five 

 eggs incubated and one egg quite fresh ; also another nest in the 

 decayed trunk of a beech tree in the woods below Hochelaga, 

 June 3, 1883, containing four eggs, and in the same tree two eggs; 

 May 2ist, 1887, another nest, with one egg, in a hole in the dead 

 limb of a tree on the spur of Mount Royal. The flicker's nest can 

 often be discovered by the quantity of chips strewn over the 

 ground under the tree, from the hole they have been excavating 

 in it. {Wintle.) One of these birds has nested in a telegraph 

 post in front of my house at Kew Beach, Toronto, for the past 

 five summers and has never yet s^icceeded in hatching its eggs on 

 account of its nest being robbed by boys. As many as 40 eggs 

 have been taken from this nest in one season; as fast as the eggs 

 are taken the bird lays another lot and in spite of this persecution 

 returns every spring to its old home. Higher up in the same 

 telegraph, post a pair of tree swallows nest annually and succeed 

 in hatching out their brood as the hole is too small for the boys 

 to get their hands into. (IV.Ratne.) Nests taken at Ottawa are 

 in holes in stubs or broken trees. Eggs five to seven, pure white, 

 laid on a bed of small chips and dust. (G. R. White.) First seen 

 in 1892 at Indian Head, Assa., April igth. After this they became 

 common and were nesting by May gth, one shot at this date had 

 its stomach full of ants. First seen in 1894 at Medicine Hat, 

 Assa., on April 12th. After that they became common and could 

 scarcely be distinguished from the form I call the hybrid flicker. 

 Both forms were breeding. Later this species was found at Crane 

 Lake and very common in the timber at the east end of the 

 Cypress Hills. In May, 1895, ^^ ^^^ found breeding with the 

 hydrid form at Old Wives' Creek and the eggs of each taken. 

 Both nests were in holes of Acer Negundo. It was also found at 

 Wood Mountain and along Frenchman's River in the Cypress 

 Hills. Common and breeding at Banff, Rocky Mountains, in 

 1891. Met with at Revelstoke in 1890 in company with hybrids 

 and the red-shafted flicker. (Macoun.) A very common summer 

 visitant. Found everywhere. It is plentiful in the Magdalen 

 Islands where its former nest-holes are sometimes occupied by the 

 small owls that breed there. Once in the county of Renfrew I 



