YELLOW-BELLIED WOODPECKER OR SAPSUCKER. 27 



stomachs. Where a bird pecks wood as much as do these, it is no 

 wonder that some of it is swallowed with the grubs that are embed- 

 ded therein. 



Summary. — The foregoing discussion of the food of the two species 

 of Picoides shows that these birds act as "conservators of the forest" 

 in the strongest sense. Three-fourths of their food consists of the 

 direst enemies of forest trees. In the Report on Forest Insects by 

 the United States Entomological Commission, some 25 species of 

 cerambycid and buprestid beetles are noted as preying upon the ash 

 tree and 3.5 upon the pine. Since the family Ceramb} r cida3 contains 

 upward of 7,500 species, of which 600 are found in America, since all 

 pass their larval stage within the substance of some tree or woody 

 plant, and since many remain in the larval state two or three years, 

 evidently they inflict upon forest trees and other plants an immense 

 amount of damage. Probably there are not many other agencies 

 more destructive to timber than this family of beetles. Nor is timber 

 safe even after it has been cut. Logs lying in the mill yard or forest 

 may be ruined in a single season if these creatures are not prevented 

 from depositing their eggs. So long do some of these larvae live in the 

 wood that they sometimes emerge after it has been converted into 

 furniture and passed into household use. A very efficient check upon 

 the undue increase of these insects is found in the woodpeckers, 

 especially the two species of Picoides. In orchards, or in parks, it 

 may be easy to combat insect enemies by insecticides or other arti- 

 ficial means, but in the forest this is more difficult and expensive, and 

 it behooves the forester to take advantage of all helpers which Nature 

 has provided; among these, insectivorous birds must take high rank. 

 It is unfortunate that in most places three-toed woodpeckers are not 

 as numerous as many other species, and for this reason they should be 

 protected and encouraged in every possible way. 



YELLOW-BELLIED WOODPECKER OR SAPSUCKER. 



(Sphyrapicus varius and subsp.) 



The yellow-bellied woodpecker or sapsucker (PL II) is probably 

 the most migratory of all our woodpeckers. It breeds throughout 

 the whole of southern Canada from ocean to ocean and thence south- 

 ward to northeastern California, western Texas, northern Missouri, 

 northern Ohio, and Massachusetts, and in the mountains south to 

 North Carolina. It winters from near the southern limit of the 

 breeding range south to Mexico, Cuba, and Costa Rica. 



It is to this species that the term sapsucker is most often and most 

 justly applied, for it drills holes in the bark of certain trees and 

 drinks the sap. It feeds also on cambium, insects, and wild fruits 

 and berries. 



