130 LIFE HISTOEIES OF NORTH AMEEIOAI^ BIKDS. 



of other more or less local names, is nearly coextensive with its geographical 

 distribution. In the more northern portions of its range it is a regular migrant, 

 while it is usually a resident south of latitude 38°, and winters in considerable 

 numbers farther north, stragglers remaining even in Maine and New Brunswick. 

 In the Southern States it is much more abundant in winter than in summer; still 

 a number of these birds breed in southern Florida, while it appears to be a 

 rather rare breeder in the immediate vicinity of the Gulf coast, in Louisiana 

 and eastern Texas. It is a very common bird in suitable localities throughout 

 the eastern United States and the more southern parts of the Dominion of 

 Canada, being generally found below altitudes of 4,000 feet, and few species 

 are more generally and better known than the Flicker. Its breeding range also 

 is more extensive than that of any other member of this family found on the 

 North American continent, ranging from about latitude 28° in Florida to Fort 

 Anderson, British North America, in latitude 68° 35' N., and probably still 

 farther north. Here Mr. R. MacFarlane reports it as "by no means scarce in 

 the valley of the Anderson; but, as its eggs were not in demand, very few 

 indeed were gathered for transmission to Washington, D. C." ^ 



It probably breeds throughout Alaska; both Messrs. J. Lockhart and Robert 

 Kennicott forwarded skins and eggs from Fort Yukon, which are now in the 

 United States National Museum collection, and it has been taken within a few 

 miles of the coast in Bering Strait. One of the most western breeding records 

 known to me is that furnished by Mr. R. MacFarlane, from Fort St. James, Stew- 

 art's Lake, British Columbia, who found the Flicker not uncommon there, both 

 skins and eggs, taken in the summer of 1890, having been forwarded by him 

 to the United States National Museum. In Labrador it is rare, and I doubt 

 if it breeds there to any extent, excepting perhaps in the extreme southern 

 portions. Along the western borders of its range in the United States it inter- 

 grades with Colaptes cafer, and quite an extensive transition zone exists here, 

 including western Texas, the eastern slopes of the Rocky Mountains, and 

 adjacent ranges, in which typical specimens of both species are found, as well 

 as many intermediates which show the chief characteristics of one or the other 

 species more or less distinctly. The same conditions exist to a somewhat less 

 degree on the Pacific Coast, in California, Oregon, Washington, and British 

 Columbia, where Colaptes auratus from Alaska intergrades with Colaptes cafer 

 from the interior, and probably also with the darker northwest coast form, known 

 as Colaptes cafer saturatior. For more detailed information on this subject I 

 refer the reader to Dr. J. A. Allen's interesting paper.^ 



The Flicker is one of the most sociable of our Woodpeckers, and is 

 apparently always on good terms with its neighbors. Birds which migrate 

 usually return to their summer homes early in April, and occasionally even 

 in March, and one will not have far to go tlien without hearing some of its 



1 Proceedings U. S. National Museum, 1891, vol. 14, p. 438. 



^ The North American Species of the Genus Colaptes, considered with special reference to the rela- 

 tionships of Colaptes auratus and Colaptes cafer, published by the American Museum of Natural History, 

 Bulletin, Vol. IV, 1892, pp. 21-44. 



