DO OTHER WOODPECKERS TAP TREES; 
93 
general ill repute attached to the whole family by most agriculturists — is the sole 
author of this work, which so often amounts to mischief, there is abundant evidence to 
disprove. In most parts of Massachusetts, particularly in the Connecticut Valley, 
this species is so extremely rare that I have never seen more than half a dozen speci- 
mens in a year, and oftener none at all. and then always during its migrations; while 
other expert collectors have searched for it unsuccessfully for years; yet our orchards 
always present these perforations in profusion, though seldom to an injurious degree: 
and now and then a forest tree is observed so thoroughly girdled as to be thus destroyed . 
For this our spotted woodpeckers, Picus pubcsccns and P. rillosus. are chargeable, 
being in many sections the sole authors of it; they may be, in fact, very often seen 
engaged in it. I do not. however, suppose their object to be the same as that assigned 
to the Sphyrapicus variiis — that of sucking sap or feeding on the inner bark. 1 
Evidence supporting the same contention is given by Mr. C. K. 
Reed, who says: 
Most of you have probably noticed apple trees that had rows of holes extending 
around, or nearly around, the trunk. I was always told, and frequently see it in print 
iK >w. that these were made 
by sapsuckers. Perhaps 
some of them are. but not 
all. Last fall I watched 
a downy busily at work 
hammering on the trunk 
of an apple tree. He 
would pound away for 
about half a minute stead- 
ily in one spot and then 
hitch sideways about an 
inch and repeat the opera- 
tion; when he had com- 
pletely encircled the tree 
he dropped down about 
his length and made 
another ring around the 
trunk. The marks left on 
the tree were identical 
with those that I had 
supposed were made by 
the sapsuckers. The downy did not appear to find anything to eat. and I concluded 
that he was doing it in play or that he wished to sharpen his bill. 2 
There is one fallacy included or implied in most of the above quo- 
tations, namely, that a profusion of punctures in trees where the sap- 
suckers are scarce proves that the work was done by other wood- 
peckers. This by no means follows. In most cases the bulk of the 
pecking on trees is old; only a moderate number of punctures, as a 
rule, are made each year, and the amount of fresh work rather than 
the total should be considered in determining the probable agent. 
A tree 100 years old — a moderate age — might bear much sapsucker 
work, even where the birds are very scarce and only a few holes were 
drilled in it each year. When a great number of punctures are made 
1 Mem. Bost. Soc. Aat. Hist.. I. 499. 1869. 
2 Bien. Rep. Commissioner Fish, and Game, Ind., p. 733, 1905-6. 
Sift 
Fig. 39.— Flicker. Not a sapsucker. Has black spot on breast, but top 
of head from bill is not red. Has conspicuous white rump. 
