THE GOLDEN-WINGED WOODPECKER. 425 
Woodpecker (Picus pubescens) is a no less interesting bird 
than the Golden-winged Woodpecker (Colaptes auratus). 
They are equally beneficial and much more familiar. They 
breed in the orchard and in the trees about our dwellings 
with as much confidence as in the forest, and visit us in all 
seasons of the year, and are especially welcome in winter. 
This bird receives the opprobrious name of "sap-sucker," a 
reproach which none casts upon him but the ignorant, who 
condemn him as mischievous without investigation, and then 
wickedly execute their judgment without mercy. In the 
latter part of September, and in all the months of October 
and November, this bird enters the orchard and selects those 
trees which have the smoothest bark and are the healthiest, 
and begins to pick small holes about one-quarter of an inch 
in diameter, quite through the bark, and from half an inch 
to an inch apart, in parallel lines around the trunk of the 
tree, which circles of holes are from one to two inches 
above each other. These lines of holes are extended up the 
whole length of the trunk of the tree, and sometimes around 
the larger limbs diverging from it. 
It is well known that some of the insects injurious to fruit 
trees deposit their eggs in the latter part of summer and in 
the autumn, laying them under the bark and in crevices 
about the tree, in fact in any secret place they find. As they 
ascend the tree, perforated by the woodpecker, they are not 
at a loss to find a suitable place for their purpose. If they 
pass the first, second, or third tier of holes, there are others 
above them as well adapted to their wants, and in them they 
may deposit their eggs, and cover them with a covering in- 
destructible by the weather. Others find in them a retreat 
from daylight and from storms, and in them some other 
‘sects lie dormant, shrouded in their silken cocoons. In 
this we see the wisdom of the Creator who supplies the 
Wants of all his creatures. He teaches the ant, the squirrel, 
and the bee, to hoard and gather for themselves a sufficiency 
of food for winter; but to the Downy Woodpecker he has 
AMER. NATURALIST, VOL. III. 54 

