1872 .] 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST 
13 
The Golden-Winged Woodpecker. 
BY ERNEST INGERSOLL, OBEELIN, O. 
It is almost impossible and entirely useless to 
discover the various names the Golden-winged 
Woodpecker has re¬ 
ceived from the persons 
whose orchards, and oc¬ 
casionally whose corn- 
fields, he visits. In the 
West he is commonly 
called “ High - holder,” 
in Ohio and Pennsylva¬ 
nia" Flicker,” “ Yellow- 
hammer,” and “Pint,” 
while New Yorkers sim¬ 
plify the thing, and dub 
him “Clape.” His or¬ 
nithological name is 
Colaptes auratus. Like 
the most of his class lie 
is migratory in his hab¬ 
its, arriving upon Lake 
Erie from the South the 
second week in April, 
and leaving again in Oc¬ 
tober. Their migrations 
are performed by night, 
as we are informed by 
the whistling of their 
wings overhead. Less 
shy and retiring in his 
disposition than many 
of his congeners, you 
may seek him in the 
edge of the woods and 
in old orchards, where, 
perched upon some tall 
stub or fence stake, he 
calls out so joyously his 
clear, ringing, sonorous chant, that we are cer- 
'Yin even “High-hole” appreciates the glad re¬ 
vival of sunny days, and contributes, to the 
best of his ability, music to the awakening mel¬ 
ody. It is, indeed, the best he can do, and 
though we may not perhaps name it a song, it 
is always welcomed 
as the announce¬ 
ment of returning 
warmth and life. 
The Golden-wing 
is a type of one form 
among the wood¬ 
peckers. It is dis¬ 
tinguished from the 
true woodpeckers 
by its curved and 
compressed beak, 
and by the broad, 
strong shafts, dyed 
bright, golden yel¬ 
low, which are so 
conspicuous during 
flight, and furnish 
the bird its name. 
The upper plumage 
is umber brown, 
barred with black; 
•beneath, buff yel¬ 
low, with numer¬ 
ous spots of black, 
prevails; a lunated 
mark of vivid red 
glows amid the iron gray of the hind-head, 
while a collar of jet black, meeting upon 
the breast, separates the buff of the lower parts 
'from the cinnamon of the throat. The tail is 
beautifully marked with brown, yellow, black, 
•and white, and the shaft of each feather pro¬ 
trudes beyond the vane in a hard spine. The 
use of this conformation is evident, when we 
consider that the tail, pressed against the trunk, 
is used by the bird as a support in climbing. 
We have said that the Golden-wing- differed, 
THE GOLDEN-WINGED WOODPECKIiK .—(Colaptes CLUVatUS.) 
in certain respects from other woodpeckers- 
We may therefore look for change of habit. 
This variation we find not only in the manner 
of locomotion, but more notably in the food 
which he affects. As the cherries and different 
varieties of berries ripen, he dines sumptuously 
upon them. Young ants, however, of which he 
is passionately fond, form his regular diet. 
These inhabit old, decaying stumps and pros¬ 
trate logs in prodigious numbers, and his stout 
bill, seemingly shaped for this very purpose, 
unearths them as readily as with a pickax. 
Of course by the destruction of myriads of 
ants our friend is of great benefit to the farmer. 
He no doubt understands this, and feeling that 
one good turn deserves another, when the far¬ 
mer’s corn is nicely ripening, makes frequent 
visits to his field, tear¬ 
ing open the husks with 
his powerful beak, and 
devouring * with the 
greatest avidity the suc¬ 
culent kernels. Not sel¬ 
dom, however, the far¬ 
mer himself, stealing 
through the waving 
corn, espies him at his 
delicious feast, and ere 
poor Yellow - hammer 
can escape, brings him 
fluttering down with his 
cruel shot. Undoubted¬ 
ly, farmer John, he stole 
an ear or two of your 
growing corn, but un¬ 
doubtedly he has killed 
a thousand or two in¬ 
dustrious ants in yonder 
stump in the fence-cor¬ 
ner, which repays 3 - ou a 
hundred-fold. About the 
middle of May in this 
latitude the G >lden- 
wing, having wooed and 
won a mate, seeks a 
nesting-place. The pair 
fly from tree to tree, run 
up and down the trunk 
and along the branches, 
chase each other in 
queer, twisted spirals all 
over the tree, peering 
into crevices, prying off loose scales of bark, 
digging a little way into the yielding trunk of 
a dead cotton-wood, or rapping vigorously upon 
the sound surface of a hard maple, until a 
proper site is discovered. This is generally in 
the tall, dead stub of some ancient tree, a mon¬ 
ument of the scath¬ 
ing fires which 
felled its compan¬ 
ions long ago; often 
in the dead, top 
limb of an old ap¬ 
ple - tree; some¬ 
times, in remote 
orchards, within 
five or six feet of 
the ground. After 
the location is fixed 
upon, all their time 
is occupied in the 
preparation of the 
nest, and so intent 
are they upon their 
work that j-ou may 
approach quite near 
without exciting 
alarm, and often 
they continue their 
labor, affectionately 
relieving each oth¬ 
er, long after other 
birds are asleep. A 
hole is first dug 
straight forward a few inches, and then perpen¬ 
dicularly downward, eight, twelve, even eighteen 
inches, according to season and circumstances. 
It is exactly circular, smooth, and gourd-shaped 
within, and chiseled out of the firm wood by the 
unassisted beaks of the tw T o birds, of whose 
FLYMOUTn iiock fowls.— (See page 18.) 
