PLATE CXXXVIL 



Der mittlereBuntfpechte. IVirfmg. Vog. /. 37. 

 Pic varie a tete rouge. Buff, PL Enl, 611. 

 Middle Spotted Woodpecker. Ar^. ZooL t,p. S78. D, 

 Brit. Zsol. I. Ns. 86. /. 37. 



A native of Europe ; in its manners oF life refembling the refl: of 

 its tribe, living chiefly in woods, and fubfifting principally on infers, 

 which it picks out of the trunks of decayed trees. Its length is about 

 cioht inches and a half. 



o 



Whether the, Middle and the Greater Spotted Woodpeckers are of 

 the fame fpecies, differing only in the tranfition of the plumage from 

 an incomplete to a more perfeft date, or that it is in reality diftinR, 

 appears to have excited confiderable doubts in the opinions of ornitho- 

 logifts ; fome contending they are, and others that they are not the 

 fame. It is poffiblc the formiCr furmife may be correft, though at the 

 lame time it cannot but be obferved, that the chara61ers of the two 

 kinds appear fufficiently conftant and obvious to authorife a different 

 concluhon. The principal diPiindlion that prevails in the two birds 

 confifts in tlie Middle Spotted Woodpecker having the whole crown 

 of the head crimfon, while in the Greater Spotted, the ciimfon fpace 

 is confined to a broad band on the hind head. The latter bird is 

 rather larger, and meafures half an inch more in the length than the 

 other. Except the diflerence above-mentioned, the plumage in both 

 pretty nearly alike. 



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