Length: A little over 6½ inches; the smallest of our woodpeckers.

General Appearance: A small black and white bird, with a white stripe extending down the middle of its back; a red patch on back of male’s head. The tail is used for a prop as the woodpecker climbs tree-trunks.

Male: Upper parts black and white; crown of head black with red patch at nape; two broad white stripes above and below eye; a broad white stripe down the center of back; wings spotted and barred with white; tail sharply pointed; the long tail-feathers, black; the short outer tail-feathers, white barred with black; bill long, strong, with a tuft of feathers at its base.

Female: Like male, except for the absence of a red patch on the head.

Notes: A call-note Peek-peek. A metallic Tut-tut-tut’-tut-tut-tut-tut might be considered the Downy’s song, but he belongs really to the group of songless birds. He beats loud tattoos on the boughs of trees, especially at mating time.

Flight: Labored, jerky, with a characteristic shutting of the wings against the sides.

Habitat: Tree-trunks in woods and orchards, and on lawns. The Downy is our most common woodpecker, and a permanent resident.

Range: Northern and central parts of eastern North America, from Alberta, Manitoba, and Ungava, south to eastern Nebraska, Kansas, the Potomac Valley, and in the mountains to North Carolina.

The SOUTHERN DOWNY WOODPECKER of the South Atlantic and Gulf States is smaller and browner than its northern relative.

The Downy Woodpecker is a member of a family of birds that has attracted man’s attention since the old days of superstition. Various myths have grown up around these birds; those of the American Indians are possibly the most interesting. Until recently, woodpeckers have been persecuted by the white man, because of their habit of pecking at trees which they were thought to kill. Many have been unjustly slain.

While one branch of the family, the Sapsuckers, have done a great deal of harm to forests where they breed, and other woodpeckers have done occasional damage, it is now known that they are invaluable as preservers of our trees. Entomologists and foresters consider them the greatest enemies known of spruce-bark beetles and sap-wood borers. As borers are found near the surface in living trees, the holes made by woodpeckers while extracting them soon heals and leaves little mark.

An examination of the structure of woodpeckers shows the admirable way in which they are fitted for their work. They have short, stout legs; strong feet, usually with two toes in front and two in the back; large claws, and stiff tails tipped with sharp spines, to aid them in supporting themselves firmly against tree-trunks and branches. Mr. Forbush says: “The bird is thus more fully equipped for climbing than a telegraph lineman. The claws and tail take the place of the man’s hand and spurs.”[37]

Professor Beal writes the following: “As much of the food of woodpeckers is obtained from solid wood, Nature has provided most of them with a stout beak having a chisel-shaped point which forms an exceedingly effective instrument. But the most peculiar and interesting point in the anatomy of these birds is the tongue. This is more or less cylindrical in form and usually very long. At the anterior end it generally terminates in a hard point, with more or less barbs upon the sides. Posteriorly the typical woodpecker tongue is extended in two long, slender filaments of the hyoid bone which curl up around the back of the skull and, while they commonly stop between the eyes, in some species they pass around the eye, but in others enter the right nasal opening and extend to the end of the beak. In this last case the tongue is practically twice the length of the head. Posteriorly this organ is inclosed in a muscular sheath by means of which it can be extruded from the mouth to a considerable length, and used as a most effective instrument for dislodging grubs or ants from their burrows in wood or bark. Hence, while most birds have to be content with such insects as they find on the surface or in open crevices, the woodpeckers devote their energies to those larvÆ or grubs which are beneath the bark or even in the heart of the tree. They locate their hidden prey with great accuracy, and often cut small holes directly to the burrows of the grubs.”[38]

Mr. Forbush calls attention to the wonderfully constructed head of a woodpecker “which is built so that it can withstand hard and continuous hammering. The skull is very thick and hard. Its connection with the beak is strong, but at the same time springy, and somewhat jar-deadening. The membrane which surrounds the brain is very thick and strong.”[39]

The Downy is the smallest member of the woodpecker family in North America, and is one of the most useful. He is especially fond of orchards and shade trees, and not only devours insects that infest them during the spring and summer, but eats the eggs they laid in the crevices of the bark during the winter. One Downy alone is of inestimable value in an orchard or a grove. Mr. Forbush writes as follows: “When the Metropolitan Park Commission first began to set out young trees along the parkways of Boston, some species of trees were attacked by borers; but the Downy Woodpeckers found them out and extracted the grubs, saving most of the trees.

“The untiring industry of this bird and the perfection of its perceptive powers may be shown by the experience of Mr. Bailey. On March 28, 1899, a Downy Woodpecker that he watched climbed over and inspected one hundred and eighty-one woodland trees between 9:40 A. M. and 12:15 P. M., and made twenty-six excavations for food. Most of these holes exposed galleries in the trunks in high branches where wood-boring ants were hiding.... These ants often gain an entrance at some unprotected spot on a living tree, and so excavate the wood of the trunk that the tree is blown down by the wind. This woodpecker acts as a continual check on the increase of such ants.”[39]

The Downy may easily be attracted to our yards by a piece of suet fastened securely to a tree. During the past winter, one has sought my suet-cage, in company with chickadees and nuthatches. This spring he brought his mate to a maple in front of the house. He has seemed excited and happy, and has drummed persistently on a certain broken limb of the tree. He has indulged in numerous rapid flights and his metallic, ringing call.