The Lewis Woodpecker 
No. 201 
Lewis’s Woodpecker 
A. O. U. No. 408. Asyndesmus lewisi Riley. 
Synonym.— Black Woodpecker. 
Description. — Adults: Above shining black with a greenish bronzy luster; 
“face” including extreme forehead, space about eye, cheeks, and chin, rich crimson 
(carmine or oxblood red); a collar around neck continuous with breast hoary ash; this 
ashy mingled intimately with carmine, or spectrum red, on remaining underparts, 
save flanks, thighs, and crissum, which are black; feathers of nape and underparts 
black and compact at base, but finely dissected on colored portion of tips, each barb 
lengthened and bristly in character. Bill and feet black; iris brown. Young birds 
lack the crimson mask and hoary collar; the underparts are gray mingled with dusky 
below, with skirtings of red in increasing abundance according to age. Length of 
adult 254-279.4 (10.00-11.00); wing 171.5 (6.75); tail 95 (3.74); bill 30.5 (1.20); tarsus 
25.4 (1.00). 
Recognition Marks. —Robin size; shining black above, hoary collar and breast; 
red mingled with hoary ash on underparts distinctive. 
Nesting. — Nest: In hole excavated in live or dead tree, usually at considerable 
height. Eggs: 5-9; white, slightly glossed. Av. size 26.2 x 20.3 (1.03 x .80). Season: 
May 15-June 15; one brood. 
General Range. —Transition zone of western United States from southern 
British Columbia and southern Alberta south to California and western Texas, and 
from the Black Hills of South Dakota, and western Kansas, west to the inner coast 
ranges of California and the western slopes of the Cascades, or rarely to Vancouver 
Island. 
Distribution in California. —Summer resident, of rather sporadic appearance 
locally, in high Upper Sonoran and Transition areas of the northern counties from the 
Warners to the Siskiyous and Trinities, south along both slopes of the Sierras, and 
irregularly along the inner coast ranges; casually south in summer (probably breeding) 
to San Bernardino Valley, Ventura County (Sespe), and Santa Barbara. Of usual 
though irregular occurrence in winter in timbered sections anywhere west of the Sierras 
and in the San Diegan district. 
Authorities.—Audubon {Picus torquatus), Orn. Biog., vol. v., 1839, p. 176 
(Calif.); Marsden, Condor, vol. ix., 1907, p. 27 (feeding habits); Bolander, Condor, 
vol. xvi., 1914, p. 183 (Alameda Co., nesting). 
NOT the least strange of the many new creatures discovered by a 
famous expedition of a hundred years ago was this curious black wood¬ 
pecker, which Wilson named torquatus (collared), but which soon became 
known by the name of the intrepid leader, Captain Meriwether Lewis. 
In habit and appearance the bird combines crow, jay, woodpecker, 
flicker, and flycatcher. It is perhaps as flycatcher that we know him best, 
as we see him sail out from the summit of a cottonwood or towering 
pine-tree and make connection with some object to us invisible. If the 
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