Web
and Book design, Copyright, Kellscraft Studio 1999-2007 (Return to Web Text-ures) |
Click
Here to return to Everyday Birds Content Page Return to the Previous Chapter |
(HOME) |
XVI THE FLICKER
THE flicker is the largest of our common American woodpeckers, being somewhat longer and stouter than the robin. It is known, by sight at least, to almost every one who notices birds at all, and perhaps for this reason it has received an unusual number of popular names. “Golden-winged woodpecker,” which is probably the best known of these, comes from the fact that the bird’s wings are yellow on the under side. “Harry Wicket,” “Highhole,” — because its nest is sometimes pretty far above the ground, — “Yellowhammer,” and “Pigeon-woodpecker” are also among its more familiar nicknames. Unlike
other birds
of its family, the flicker passes much of its time on the ground, where
it hops
awkwardly about, feeding upon insects, especially upon ants. As you
come near
it, while it is thus engaged, it rises with a peculiar purring sound,
and as it
flies from you it shows a broad white patch on its rump — the lower
back, above
the root of the tail. Every one who has ever walked much over grassy
fields
must have seen the bird and been struck by this conspicuous light mark.
.He
must have noticed, too, the bird’s peculiar up-and-down, “jumping”
manner of flight,
by which it goes swooping across the country in long undulations or
waves. The
flicker’s
general color is brown, with spot tings and streakings of black, and
more or
less of violet or lilac shading. On the back of its neck it wears a
band of
bright scarlet, and across its breast is a conspicuous black crescent. It is fond
of old
apple orchards, and often makes its nest in a decaying trunk. In some
places,
near the seashore, especially, — where it is commoner than elsewhere in
winter,
and where large trees are scarce, — it makes enemies by its habit of
drilling
holes in barns and even in churches. I remember a meeting-house on Cape
Cod
which had a good number of such holes in its front wall — or rather it
had the
scars of such holes, for they had been covered with patches of tin.
That was a
case where going to church might be called a bad habit. In fall
and winter,
if not at other seasons, the flicker feeds largely upon berries. In
years when
the poison ivy bears a good crop, I am pretty sure to find two or three
flickers all winter long about a certain farm, the stone walls of which
are
overrun with this handsome but un wholesome vine, although it is hard
to
imagine that the dry, stony fruit should yield much in the way of
nourishment,
even to a woodpecker. As spring
comes on,
the flicker becomes numerous and very noisy. His best known vocal
effort is a
prolonged hi-hi-hi, very loud
and ringing, and kept up until the listener
wonders where the author of it gets his wind. This, I think, is the
bird’s
substitute for a song. He has at all times a loud, unmusical yawp, — a signal,
I suppose, — and in the mating season especially he utters a very
affectionate, conversational wicker
or flicker. Every country boy
should be
familiar with these three notes. But
besides being a
vocalist, — we can hardly call him a singer, — the flicker is a player
upon
instruments. He is a great drummer; and if any one imagines that
woodpeckers do
not enjoy the sound of their own music, he should watch a flicker
drumming with
his long bill on a battered tin pan in the middle of a pasture. Morn
ing after
morning I have seen one thus engaged, drumming lustily, and then
cocking his
head to listen for an answer; and Paderewski at his daily practice upon
the
piano could not have looked more in earnest. At other times the flicker
contents himself with a piece of resonant loose bark or a dry limb. One proof
that this
drumming — which is indulged in by woodpeckers generally — is a true
musical
performance, and not a mere drill ing for grubs, is the fact that we
never hear
it in winter. It begins as the weather grows mild, and is as much a
sign of
spring as the peeping of the little tree-frogs — hylas — in the meadow.
The
flicker’s nest,
as I have said, is built in a hole in a tree, often an apple-tree. Very
noisy
in his natural disposition, he keeps a wise silence while near the spot
where
his mate is sitting, and will rear a brood under the orchard-owner’s
nose
without betraying himself. The young birds are fed from the parent’s
crop, as
young pigeons-and young hummingbirds are. The old bird thrusts its bill
down
the throat of the nestling and gives it a meal of partially digested
food by
what scientific people call a process of regurgitation. Farmers’ boys,
who have
watched pigeons feeding their squabs, will know precisely what is
meant. |