Cambridge, Mass.
1910
Feb. 14 [February 14, 1910]
  The only birds that have visited our place with
any regularity this winter and the only ones I have seen
there at all thus far in the present month, are Flickers.
Once I noted four and on several occasions three together
but ordinary [ordinarily] there have been only one or two seen at any
one time. Their visits have been much oftenest in the 
morning about 8 or 9 o'clock. For a time they contented
themselves with feasting on the berries of our hackberry &
Parkman apple trees. About two weeks ago they began
working on the trunks of two large pear trees. After
knocking off the loose scabs of outer bark they pecked
and pecked at the inner bark until the cambrian
layer was exposed in many places over spaces as large
as the palm of one's hand. All this was done in
a leisurely and desultory way as if the birds 
were merely amusing themselves which, indeed, I suspect
Flickers
in the
Garden