The Children's Book of Birds Part 31

If a whip-poor-will nest is disturbed, the mother will pretend to be badly hurt. She will tumble about on the ground and cry like the whine of a young puppy, trying to coax away the one she fears. If she is too much alarmed, she will clasp her young one between her feet and fly away with it.

Instead of the common whip-poor-will of the Northern and Middle States, the South has the CHUCK-WILL'S-WIDOW, who is somewhat larger. The West has the POOR-WILL, or the NUTTALL'S WHIP-POOR-WILL, who is rather smaller and paler than either. The habits of all are about the same.

They are called solitary birds. That is, they are not found in parties like swallows or crows. They do not sing or call when flying.

These birds are hard to watch because they come out in the dark, and can then see so much better than we can. So we know little about their ways.

The NIGHTHAWK'S looks, and all his ways, are different. He wears the same colors that the whip-poor-will does, but they are arranged in another way. They are put in bars running across the back and tail, and there is a great deal of white on his upper breast. On the wing is a large white spot that looks like a hole across it, when you see him flying away up in the air. You can always know him by this.

[Ill.u.s.tration: NIGHTHAWK]

Then he does not act like the whip-poor-will. He is a high flyer, sailing about over our heads in the afternoon or evening. He is not silent on the wing. Now and then he gives a strange sharp cry like "peent." He is busy catching flies and mosquitoes as he goes. Sometimes you will see him dive head first toward the earth as if he would dash himself against it. At the same time he makes a loud sound, like blowing into the bunghole of an empty barrel. But before he touches, he turns and skims along just above the ground.

The mother nighthawk, like the whip-poor-will, makes no nest. She chooses a sunny spot in a pasture or on a hillside to put her eggs.

Sometimes in the cities, where flies and other things to eat are so plentiful, she takes a flat house-roof for her nursery. Many pairs of down-covered baby night hawks are brought up over our heads, and we do not know it.

The family name of Goatsuckers was given to the birds from the foolish notion that they took milk from the goats. By watching them, it has been found that when they are so busy around the goats or cattle, they are really catching the insects which torment them. So they are doing a kindness to the beasts, instead of an injury.

FOOTNOTE:

[22] See Appendix, 21.

XXIX

THE WOODp.e.c.k.e.r FAMILY

(_Picidae_)[23]

YOU may generally know a woodp.e.c.k.e.r the moment you see him on a tree. He will--if he follows woodp.e.c.k.e.r fashions--be clinging to the trunk, or a big branch, propped up by his stiff tail, and not perched crosswise like most other birds.

There are a good many of this family in the world. We have twenty-four species in North America. They differ from other birds in two or three ways. First their toes are always in pairs, two turned forward and two turned backward, except in one genus, which has but three toes. So they can hold on better than anybody else.

Then again the tails of woodp.e.c.k.e.rs are not like most birds' tails. They are strong and stiff, so that they can be used as props to hold the bird in the queer position he likes so well.

Oddest of all are the woodp.e.c.k.e.r tongues. They are round, worm-shaped it is called, and except in the genus of sapsuckers, very long. They can be pushed out far beyond the end of the beak. That is so that they can reach into a deep hole for the insects they eat. They have little barbs or sharp points on the tip, to catch their prey, and they are sticky besides. The tongue of the sapsucker has a brush at the end and is not barbed.

One of the most notable things about a woodp.e.c.k.e.r is his bill, which he uses as a drill and also to drum with.

Woodp.e.c.k.e.rs are made to take care of the large limbs and trunks of trees, to get out from under the bark the grubs which would kill them.

They are perfectly fitted for the work.

As you learn more about birds and beasts, you will see that every one is exactly fitted for his work in life. A worm is as well fitted to be a worm as a bird is to be a bird. How this came to be so has long been a study of the wise men, and they have not found out all about it yet.

The largest of this family that is common is the GOLDEN-WINGED WOODp.e.c.k.e.r, or FLICKER. He is as large as a pigeon. In the Eastern States is the golden-wing, in the West and California the red-shafted, who differs merely in the dress.

The gold-winged woodp.e.c.k.e.r has a brown back with black bars, and a light breast with heavy black spots. His wings and tail are yellow on the inside. He has a bright red collar on the back of his neck, a heavy black crescent on his breast, and black cheek patches or bars running down from the corners of his mouth.

The RED-SHAFTED FLICKER has red cheek patches instead of black, and omits the red collar altogether. His breast is a little grayer, and the wing and tail linings are scarlet. Both flickers have large white spots on the back, above the tail, which show very plainly when they fly.

These two varieties of the flicker are found from the Atlantic to the Pacific. Their ways of living are the same, and what is said of one will do as well for the other.

A flicker hangs himself up to sleep. He takes a good hold of a tree trunk, or upright limb, with his grapnel-shaped toes, presses his stiff tail against the bark, and hangs there all night. When he flies, he goes in great waves, as if he were galloping through the air.

The nest of this woodp.e.c.k.e.r is a snug little room in a tree trunk, or sometimes a telegraph-pole. He usually selects a tree that is dead, or partly so, but sometimes he takes a solid one. The little room is cut out by the strong, sharp beaks of the pair. The door of this home is just a round hole rather high up on the trunk. A pa.s.sage is cut straight in for a little way and then turns down, and there the room is made. It has to be of pretty good size, for the bird is fond of a large family.

Five or six and occasionally more young flickers have been found in a nest.

Fashions change in the bird world as well as in the human. Woodp.e.c.k.e.rs more than any others are changing their habits, and improving their condition. They have found an easier way to get a home than to chisel it out of wood. Nowadays woodp.e.c.k.e.rs often cut a hole through a board which admits them into a garret, a church tower, or the walls of an unused building, and make the nest there. Thus they save themselves much labor.

One even cut out a home in a haystack.

These birds have changed too, it is said, in their notions about eating.

They do not think it necessary to dig out every mouthful from under tree bark. The flicker feeds on the ground. He eats many insects, but mostly ants. When insects are scarce, he eats many wild berries--dogwood, black alder, poke-berries, and others--and the seeds of weeds.

Young woodp.e.c.k.e.rs in the nest are fed mostly upon insects. When they get big enough to climb up to the door of their snug home, they stick their heads out and call for something to eat. Then one can hardly pa.s.s through the woods without hearing them, for they have good loud voices.

And of course they are always hungry.

The way they are fed is by regurgitation. That is, the old bird swallows the food she gets, and when she wants to feed, she jerks it up again.

She thrusts her bill far down the little one's throat, as I told you the hummingbird does. Then she gives three or four pokes as if she were hammering it down. A young flicker does not seem to know how to swallow.

A lady once picked up a nestling who was hurt, and to get him to eat anything she had to poke it down his throat herself.

The gold-winged woodp.e.c.k.e.r is a lively bird, most interesting to know.

He makes so many strange noises that I can't tell you half of them, and his ways are as queer as his notes. He does not sing much, but he is a great drummer. When he finds a tin roof, or eaves gutter that pleases him, he will drum on it till he drives the family nearly crazy. He seems particularly to delight in waking them all up in the morning.

He can sing, too. I have heard a flicker sing a droll little song, not very loud, swinging his body from side to side as he did it.

Another thing this bird can do is dance. Two flickers will stand opposite one another and take funny little steps, forward and back, and sideways. Then they will touch their bills together and go through several graceful figures. This has been seen several times by persons whose truthfulness can be relied upon.

The RED-HEADED WOODp.e.c.k.e.r is another common one of the family, especially in the Middle States. He is a little smaller than the flicker. No one can mistake this bird, he is so plainly marked. His whole head is bright red. The rest of him is black, or bluish black, with a large ma.s.s of white on the body and wings.

This woodp.e.c.k.e.r, too, has partly given up getting food from under the bark. He takes a good deal on the wing, like a flycatcher. Sometimes he goes to the ground for a large insect like a cricket or gra.s.shopper, and he is fond of nuts, especially the little three-cornered beech-nut.

The red-head is beginning to store food for winter use, for most woodp.e.c.k.e.rs do not migrate. When beech-nuts are ripe, he gets great quant.i.ties of them, and packs them away in queer places, where he can find them when he wants them.

Some of his nuts the red-head puts in cavities in trees, others in knot-holes or under bark that is loose. Many he fits into cracks in the bark, and hammers in tight. He has been known to fill the cracks in a gate-post, and in railroad ties, and even to poke his nuts between the shingles on a roof. Any place where he can wedge a nut in he seems to think is a good one.

[Ill.u.s.tration: DOWNY WOODp.e.c.k.e.r]

A woodp.e.c.k.e.r can eat almost anything. Besides insects and nuts, he likes wild berries of all kinds--dogwood, cedar, and others that he finds in the woods.

The nest of the red-headed woodp.e.c.k.e.r is usually cut out in the dead top or limb of a tree. In prairie lands, where trees are scarce, he contents himself with telegraph-poles and fence-posts.