254 REPORT OF THE FOREST, FISH AND GAME COMMISSION. 



trees — that they do find the eggs and hibernating insects which are concealed 

 in the crevices and cracks, and destroy them. Besides caterpillars, the titmice 

 also eat some beetles, ants and bugs, with quite a number of spiders. The 

 insects' eggs taken by them consist largely of those of the two species Malacosoma, 

 or tent caterpillars, in the region where they are to be found. The beetles 

 eaten are of the smaller species of leaf -eaters (Chrysomelidae), the engraver beetles 

 (Scolytidae) and other weevils or snout beetles, especially the genus Balaninus, 

 which lays its eggs in acorns and other nuts, where the grub feeds and destroys 

 the seed. At times they find and destroy the beetles that are the parents of the 

 woodborers — that is, the Cerambycidae and Buprestidae. Bugs are represented 

 in the stomachs by a few stink bugs (Pentatomidae), but more especially by the 

 bark scales (Coccidae). The larger species, belonging to the genus Lecanium, 

 are evidently a favorite food, as they are found in many stomachs. The black 

 olive scale (L. oleae), which infests many kinds of trees besides the olive, is 

 especially abundant on the Pacific coast, and is freely eaten by that pigmy of the 

 family, the California bush tit (Psaltriparus minimus calif omicus). Other scales, 

 however, are frequently eaten. Plant-lice and their eggs are also found in the 

 stomachs, the latter occurring in the winter months. 



The Nuthatches {Sitta carolinensis and S. canadensis). 



The nuthatches are, like the titmice, lovers of the forest, and like them they 

 do not disdain to visit parks and orchards, and may occasionally be seen scrambling 

 over the trees in the dooryard. As acrobats they are unsurpassed; the wood- 

 peckers, the titmice and the creepers will run up a tree with ease and skill, but 

 they will not try to run or walk down the trunk as the nuthatches do, nor can they 

 walk along the under side of a horizontal branch with that apparent disregard for 

 the attraction of gravity that the fly displays when on the ceilings. But this is 

 an ordinary matter to the nuthatches. They walk down a tree trunk, or around 

 it, or on the under side of a branch, and stop with their body hanging downward, 

 while they inspect a knothole, apparently not in the least inconvenienced by this 

 upside-down position. Nor when pecking at anything which they think may 

 promise food do they rest upon their tails as do the woodpeckers, but, held in 

 place by the clutch of their sharp claws, they stand and work at perfect ease. 

 Four species and three subspecies of nuthatches are found within the limits of the 

 United States. They all belong to the same genus, and vary but little in general 

 appearance, or in their food habits, and the two whose names stand at the head 

 of this chapter may be taken as types of all. 



