Picine and Cnckoo-like Birds. 
91 
The present species is the smallest of our British Wood- 
peckers, and has the scapulars and lower back barred with black 
and white, the under surface being brownish with narrow streaks 
of black on the sides of the body. The crown is crimson, 
mottled with white spots and dusky bases to the feathers. The 
female differs in having the crown black, without any crimson, the forehead being of a 
buffy white colour. The young birds have only the centre of the crown crimson. 
The range of the Lesser Spotted Woodpecker is nearly the same as that of 
D. major in the British Islands, and it extends into the South of Scotland, but it is 
only an occasional visitor to Ireland. It is found throughout the greater part ol 
Europe and ranges into Eastern Siberia. 
The habits of this little species more resemble those of the Nuthatch than those 
of its ally, the Great Spotted Woodpecker. It is found in orchards and parks, and 
nests in poplars as well as in fruit-trees, and can often be seen climbing on the lower 
branches of the larger elms, or clinging to the small twigs, looking not unlike a Tit 
or Nuthatch. The eggs vary from five to eight in number, and are white ; they are 
deposited on the touch-wood at the bottom of the hole, but no attempt at a nest is 
made. 
THE LESSER 
SPOTTED 
WOODPECKER. 
( Dendrocopus minor.) 
The appearance of the Wryneck is quite different from that 
THE WRYNECK. . . , , c ...... r . 
, of the other Woodpeckers found in Britain, tor its plumage is a 
(lynx torqmlla.) . r . . 
brightly mottled brown, with rufous and black vermiculations. 
That it is a member of the great family of Woodpeckers is seen by the zygodactyle 
formation of the feet, and it has the same extensile tongue as the latter birds, from 
which, however, it differs in having a soft tail of rounded feathers, instead of the 
sharply pointed stiffened tail-feathers of the true Woodpeckers. 
The genus lynx contains a few species, all confined to the Old World, the 
majority of the Wrynecks being found in Africa. Our British bird has a wide 
range, extending in summer from Great 
Britain to Japan, and wintering in 
Northern Africa, India and China. It 
is often called the ‘ Cuckoo’s Mate,’ from 
the fact that the date of its arrival 
coincides with that of the Cuckoo, but 
in the neighbourhood of London I have 
generally noticed it to be a little later in 
coming than the last-named bird. 
Like the Woodpeckers, it lays perfectly 
white eggs, in the hole of a tree, and 
makes no nest. 
It is of a tame disposition and often 
takes advantage of any nest-box put up The Wryneck. 
