422 FLICKER. 



Now and then I found a pair of Flickers in places where they were scarcely 

 expected. In June 1867 I discovered a nest in an old solitary linden stump only a few 

 feet from the ground. This stump was about five feet high and was quite a distance 

 from the woods. The entrance hole was so large that I could easily reach the eggs 

 with my hand. The six eggs were hatched in fourteen days and the young were black 

 and very ugly. When the feathers began to grow they diffused a very strong and 

 exceedingly offensive smell. As I have made the same observations in subsequent j^ears, I 

 believe that this is due to their food which consists mainly of ants and all kinds of 

 insects and larvae which are hidden under the decayed bark and in rotten wood. The 

 nest was kept clean, as the, excrements of the young were carried away by the parents. 

 The bird has also been found nesting in a haystack that had been cut through the middle, 

 also in gate-posts, church-towers, in an old wagon hub, in dwellings and outbuildings, etc. 

 In south-western Missouri a pair regularly nested in the trees of an old apple orchard. 

 Though usually exceedingly noisy and unsuspicious, the pair was perfectly quiet in their 

 nesting haunts, and the owner of the place had no knowledge of the birds breeding so 

 near his house. The young just hatched are nourished with the soft white larvas of 

 ants. Later they are fed with all kinds of larger insects. Before they are fully fledged 

 they leave the nest, climbing around the trunk or perching on the top of the stump. 

 When danger threatens and during the night they retreat to the nest. Only one brood 

 is raised annually, even in the South. 



Prof. Wm. Brewster, in his excellent article on "A brood of young Flickers and 

 how they were fed" (Auk, Vol. X, 1893, p. 231 ff.), observed that the parent bird 

 swallowed all the food obtained during its foraging trips and afterwards supplied it to 

 its young by a process of regurgitation. 



The Woodpeckers have justly been called the carpenters among birds, as they con- 

 struct quite a number of cavities for other birds. , The Flicker also works diligenty among 

 the old stumps and dry limbs, finishing partially often quite a number of hollows before 

 it finally makes one ready for itself. After it has abandoned these different cavities, 

 the Nuthatches, Titmice, Wrens, Bluebirds, White-bellied Swallows and Crested Fly- 

 catchers fall heir to them. 



Without any doubt the Flicker is one of our most beneficial birds, deserving always 

 and everywhere the protection of man. I quote the following from Bulletin No. 7 of the 

 U. S. Department of Agriculture "On the Food of Woodpeckers" from the pen of Mr. 

 F. E. L. Beal: "Under one or the other of its various titles of Flicker, Golden-winged 

 Woodpecker, High-holder, Yellow-hammer, Pigeon Woodpecker, and Hairy Wicket, it is 

 known to every farmer and schoolboy, and, unfortunately, to certain so-called Sports- 

 men also, for this is the one Woodpecker that is often seen in city markets. In most 

 places it is a much shyer bird than either of the preceding, and while it frequents the 

 farm and approaches buildings freely it keeps more in the tops of trees and does not 

 allow so near an approach of its greatest enemy, man. This is particularly true in the 

 north-eastern part of the country, where large bags of Pigeon Woodpeckers are annually 

 made among the wild cherry trees in which the birds feed. The Flickers soon learn 

 whom they have to fear, and such knowledge seems to be hereditary. They are very 

 prolific, raising from six to ten young at a brood, and so keep reasonably abundant in 



