Feb. 2, 1901.] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
86 
have been lit and the blinds drawn, and I have been 
dreaming. 
During tea my wife said she wondered how I slept 
through such a noise, for our boy had been having a 
great time with the dogs, trying to catch them in an old 
landing net, and had them scampering round and bark- 
ing at a great rate. Later in the evening, while I was 
discussing gunpowder with a friend, my wife remarked 
chat "E C and Schultze seemed to have a good 
record." Considering the position of the ad. of those 
brands, that remark, to my mind, proved that she 
had gone further through Forest and Stream than I 
had that afternoon. Jay Bee. 
CANADA. 
Concerning] Woodpeckers. 
Reail before the Ornithological meeting of the Entomological Society o'^ 
Ontario 
While mentally reviewing in detail the attractions of 
this or that group of birds, I can scarcely single out one 
and allow it to claim special honor as a favorite family. 
Yet somehow I haA-e alwa3^s felt drawn toward the wood- 
peckers. This is strange, too, for while my own tem- 
perament is poetical, that of the Picidcs inclines, if any- 
thing, to the prosaic. 
A great blue heron in his proper element — fishing, 
for in.stance, in the summer twilight at the foot of the 
shallows — typifies for me the utmost grace of form. A 
chickadee in a midwinter slashing has been to me as an 
associate more charming in manners than any Chesterfield 
of them all. A cerulean warbler tastefully arrayed in blue 
and white brings to my eyes, even on the hottest of days, 
a cooling, restful influence. A woodthrush in the high 
June forest, in pure tones chanting his morning anthem, 
refines and ennobles the lyric outburst which heralds the 
coming in of summer. 
How stands it with the woodpeckers? Form angular, 
voice harsh,, manners doubtful, colors sometimes brilliant, 
but often barbarously laid on! Still I like them. Grace- 
fulness of form! Why, that would be out of place on 
a rail fence or the dead crown of a beech — things in 
themselves the very acme of angularity. Good man- 
ners ! Sometimes it serves manldnd right to be treated 
FLICKER. 
with suspicion or passed by with indifference. Harmoni- 
ous blending of colors! Surely in looking at the infinite 
variety of hues in which nature dresses herself there will 
at times spring to the lips the cry, "Motley's the only 
wear!" Melodious tones! Ay, in June I grant you. But 
when against my face the angry north is spitting sleet; 
when over the snowdrifts comes the sharp bark of the 
lean and hungry fox; when the frost king, hurling his 
blue javelin, smites and splits with metallic clang the 
■'gnarled and unwedgable oak." give me to hear the 
fierce, the ringing stroke of Pileatus pounding in the 
shrouded swamp, or the brave, if strident, calls of the 
redheads foraging among the beeches for their hard- 
earned daily bread. Yes, the woodpeckers fit in with 
nature even in her sternest mood— surely a sulificient 
passport to the naturalist's heart. 
The Picidcs being almost necessarily forestine, we 
might expect the family to be well represented in Mid- 
dlesex, more especially that we have such a variety of 
trees here which can naturally supply the needs of more 
species than would a larger area of uniform forest. We 
have, in fact, eight species in this county, exactly double 
the number found in Great Britain. 
Ours are: Dry abates villosus (hairy), D. pubescens 
(downy), Picoides arcticus (Arctic three-toed), Sphyrapi- 
cus varius (sapsucker), CeophlmiJ pileatus (pileated), 
Melanerpes erythroceplmlus (red-headed), M. carolinus 
(red-bellied), and Colaptes atiratm (flTcker). 
Two (the only others occurrLog^ in Ontario) may yet. 
be found here, as very rare wmter visitors from the 
North. These are: Dryobates v. Icucomelas (northern 
hairy), and Picoides americanus (American three-toed). 
I have been asked to write of the habits of these birds, 
and I find at the outset the subject much too large for 
the limits of a single paper, and indeed beyond my 
capacity in any number of papers. I could write better 
of the snakes of Iceland. Who could say, for instance, 
what a redheaded woodpecker would or would not do in- 
certain given circumstances? A farmer once came to me- 
to indignantly protest and complain of the havoc the red- 
heads were wreaking on his barn. In vain I deprecated 
all responsibility. I was forthwith brought to the spot 
and shown where the birds had battered holes through the 
roof to get at (as he mournfully averred) his peas. As 
a matter of fact, the hungry fellows were treating his 
barn as they would an old stub, but it was in order to 
get at rhe farmer's pea beetles, which in myriads were 
swarming inside. Another day the redheads might be 
sampling sweet apples, for instance, or darting oiit for 
insects in true flycatcher style, thus giving us in good 
measure of the spice variety. 
So let it be with this paper. I have a comprehensive 
text, and, like the Rev. Solomon Peter Hale, who, in 
opening up one of his celebrated lectures, gravely an- 
nounced his intention to confine his remarks to the "Past; 
the Present and the Future," I shall run the less risk 
of getting away from my subject, and whatever else it 
contains, I shall be sure to supply sufficient variety. 
Hardiness of constitution is a feature I admire in any 
HAIRY woodpecker. 
bird, and taken altogether, our woodpeckers are a hardy 
lot. The downy and hairy {Dryobates) keep a uniform 
hold on the country. Superior to mere changes in the 
weather, they are, if never numerous, never absent — 
good representatives of our rather small class of resi- 
dent birds. The redhead and red-belly {Melanerpes) in 
some ways act much alike — ^the redhead being at most 
times the more numerous. Both are summer residents. 
When beechnuts are plentiful both remain in consider- 
able numbers throughout the winter. The kind of winter 
has nothing to do with it, the supply of beechnuts alone 
deciding the question. The redhead stores many nuts 
in September in out-of-the-way places, an act of fore- 
thought I have not observed the other perform. Then 
again the red belly frequently comes to the orchard for 
frozen apples, which I have never seen a redhead doing — 
perhaps at that time he falls back on the larder he stocked 
early in the fall. Mr. Beal, of Washington, writing of 
the red-bellied woodpecker, s,?Lys,, "It is not known to 
breed north of the Carolinian fauna," and again, "Curi- 
ouslyjenough, it sometimes migrates north of its breed- 
ing raiige to spend the winter." As bearing on this lat- 
ter statement, I may say I have noticed M. carolinus in 
greater abundance during September than any other 
month in the year; and in view of the fact that it is really 
a Southern bird, I have for some time doubted that these 
numerous September individuals came from the north 
of us. Yet they have been recorded by Mr. Schoenan 
as quite common in Bruce county. If they breed there 
the species is not characteristic of the Carolinian fauna, 
for the Bruce peninsula is certainly Alleghanian, with 
a strong element of the Canadian fauna in its general 
features. 
Sphyrapicus, tippling at his sap wells, is a curious 
though common sight. My friend Mr. Joseph Beck, 
who is not only a close observer of birds in general but 
is especially well qualified to speak of woodpeckers, as- 
sures me he has seen this bird in midwinter. It is, how, 
ever, mainly migratory, commonest in spring and fall, 
SAPSUCKER, 
and a rather common summer resident. In its fondness 
for cambium it often removes considerable fresh bark. 
I have seen several fine Norway spruce ruined in this 
way. Yet it cannot live on sap alone, nor even on 
carnbium. It feeds largely on insects, many of which 
(chiefly Diptera) are attracted to the oozing sap, and 
fall an easy prey. _ _ .^^ji;,j.Jj:Ai 
Picoides articus, a rare visitant from the North, ia, in 
regard to the structure of its feet, an aberrant form, ap- 
parently able, however, to get along with its three toes 
as well as any of its four-toed relatives. I have seen 
one taken some years ago in a cedar swamp near here. 
Mr. Saunders has more recently captured an example 
and seen others. Its winter wanderings are no doubt 
more prompted by the. state of the food supply than 
they are' by the severity of the Northern climate. From 
personal knowledge, I can add nothing on its habits. 
The pileated has suffered more in consequence of the 
advent: of civilization than any other member of the 
family. Originally a common resident, his great size 
and magnificent presence have brought him more diffi- 
culties than his marvelously acute sense of sight and 
hearing have been able to surmount. While in some of 
our larger swamps he still holds royal court, his throne 
is rudely shaken, his rule one of critical though "splen- 
did isolation." ' 
Even were he not hunted at all, it is doubtful if he 
could maintain hirnself in numbers in our sadly depleted 
forest. Highly specialized in the art of wood cutting — 
chiseling large and deep "mortise holes," for instance, in 
a live white ash in order to secure a colony of ants — he 
has proved unable to adapt himself, like the redhead, itd- 
the rapidly changing conditions of the country. 
The flicker is pre-eminently an ant-eater, and I think 
it is less to avoid the rigor of our winters than to satisfy 
an insatiable craving for formic acid which prompts 
the sturdy yet' amiable yellowshaft to betake himself to 
milder climes. My latest record for the species here is 
Dec. 22 — a bleak and bare day. Indeed, the snow and 
the flickers are seldom seen together, for, although often 
perching high and feeding on many wild fruits, they are, 
aftc'- all, birds of the bare earth. 
I transcribe the following from my "bird's calendar,'" 
bearing date April 6, 1889: "Snow 6 inches deep, with 
high drifts beside. All this snow fell since yesterday 
noon. This morning is calm and mild, with a strong 
sun shining, and no doubt the snow will rapidly pass 
away, yet surely none too soon for the poor birds. Saw 
flicker for first time, in maple at edge of orchard. Later 
saw another on ant hill eating medium-sized ants which 
have a brownish head and thorax and black abdomen. 
/ 
,1 
RED-HEADED WOODFECKER. 
Think of the storm last night and the hot sun to-day. 
When the ant hill is bare of snow the inmates sally out, 
the hungry flicker comes and tlie great question crops 
up: Which is to live? How eagerly the ants were work- 
ing to clear away the accumulated debris! How prettily 
th flicker's plumage shone in the light of the western 
sun!" 
On the approach of cold weather our resident wood- 
peckers make for themselves snug retreats, in which 
they not only spend the nights, but also the very stormy 
days. These "winter shelters" are worthy of critical 
study. They are made shallower than the nest, and are 
generally closer to the ground. The first half dozen 
or so which I discovered happened not only to face the 
south, but were also situated on the southern edge of the 
woods. Later, however, I have seen too many excep- 
tions to this to allow me to generalize. 
The do',vny, the hairy and the pileated are the only 
species I know of as making these solitary cells. As- 
suming that only one is made or used by an individual 
in a season, it must restrict- his foraging ground to a 
rather limited area, and a hairy woodpecker, for ex- 
ainple, may not be such a winter wanderer as somehow 
1 have always considered him to- be. 
Most birds of the cloister lay white eggs; with the 
woodpeckers this rule is invariable. The hairy is the 
earliest nester, the red-bellied, perhaps, the latest. The 
redhead has the greatest vertical range, sometimes nest- 
ing as high as 75 feet and on the other hand, in a case I 
observed myself, as low as 15 inches from the ground, In 
choice of material to work in, carolinus selects the most 
decayed wood; 5". varius the greenest and hardest. 
Of the five nests of the pileated which I have seen in 
the county, two were in beech, two in elm, and one in 
white pine. The first one exathined was' in a beech tree 
which stood, within 100 yards of a school house, New 
Swamp College. The nest was placed at a height of 45 
feet, and on May 20 contained two fresh eggs. These 
measure in millimeters as follows: 36 x 24 and 35 x 25— 
the gems of my small oological. collection. The secbn'd 
nest found was' in an elm stub in thin woods — -the.liQle 
close- to the top- and not more than 30 feet fforri'tn^ 
ground. When examined on May 27 it contained five 
newly hatched young. The other nests proved inacces- 
sible. "The prettiest woodpecker home I ever sa-w was 
found by Mr. Beck and myself while pottering around a 
pleasant woods near the River Thames. It belonged to 
