Online Encyclopedia
Search over 40,000 articles from the original, classic Encyclopedia Britannica, 11th Edition.
WOODPECKER
Online EncyclopediaEncyclopedia Home :: WIL-YAK
del.icio.us it!
|
WOODPECKER , a See also:bird that pecks or picks holes in See also:wood, and from this See also:habit is commonly reputed to have its name; but it is in some parts of See also:England also known as " Woodspeight " (erroneously written " Woodspite ")—the latter syllable being cognate with Ger. Specht and Fr. Epeiche, possibly with See also:Lat. See also:Picus.' More than 300 See also:species have been described, and they have been very variously grouped by systematists; but all admit that they See also:form a very natural See also:family Picidae of Coraciiform
' The number. of See also:English names, See also:ancient and See also:modern, by which these birds are known is very See also:great, and even a See also:bare See also:list of them could not be here given. The Anglo-Saxon was higora or higere, and to this may plausibly be traced " hickwall," nowadays used in some parts of the See also:country, and the older " hickway," corrupted first into
highhaw," and, after its See also:original meaning was lost, into " hewhole," which in See also:North See also:America has been still further corrupted into " high-hole " and more recently into " high-holder." Another set of names includes " whetile " and " woodwale," which, different as they look, have a See also:common derivation perceptible in the intermediate form " witwale." The See also:Mid. Eng. wodehake (=woodhack) is another name apparently identical in meaning with that commonly applied to woodpecker.birds, their nearest See also:allies being the toucans. They are generally of See also:bright particoloured plumage, in which See also:black, See also: The See also:nest almost always consists of a hole _ chiselled by the bird's strong See also:beak, impelled by very powerful muscles, in the upright See also:trunk or See also:arm of a tree, the opening being quite circular, and continued as a See also:horizontal passage that reaches to the core, whence it is pierced downward for nearly a See also:foot. There a chamber is hollowed out in which the eggs, often to the number of six, white, translucent and glossy, are laid with no bedding but a few chips that may have not been thrown out .3 The See also:young are not only hatched entirely naked, but seem to become fledged without any of the downy growth common to most birds. Their first plumage is dull in colour, and much marked beneath with bars, crescents and arrowheads. Of generally similar habits are the two other woodpeckers which inhabit See also:Britain—the pied or greater spotted and the barred or lesser spotted woodpecker—Dendrocopus See also:major and D. See also:minor—each of great beauty, from the contrasted white, See also:blue-black and scarlet that enter into its plumage. Both of these birds have an extraordinary habit of causing by quickly-repeated blows of their beak on a See also:branch, or even on a small bough, a vibrating See also:noise, louder than that of a watchman's rattle, and enough to excite the See also:attention of the most incurious. Though the pied woodpecker is a See also:resident in Britain, its See also:numbers receive a considerable See also:accession nearly every autumn. 2 A patch of conspicuous colour, generally red, on this part is characteristic of very many woodpeckers, and careless writers often See also:call it " mystacial," or some more barbarously " moustachial." Considering that moustaches See also:spring from above the mouth, and have nothing to do with the mandible or lower See also:jaw, no See also:term could be more misleading. ' It often happens that, just as the woodpecker's labours are over, a pair of starlings will take See also:possession of the newly-bored hole, and, by conveying into it some nesting See also:furniture, render it unfit for the rightful tenants, who thereby suffer See also:ejectment, and have to begin all their trouble again. It has been stated of this and other wood-peckers that the chips made in cutting the hole are carefully removed by the birds to guard against their leading to the See also:discovery of the nest. The See also:present writer, however, had ample opportunity of observing the contrary as regards this species and, to some extent, the pied woodpecker next to be mentioned. Indeed there is no surer way of finding the nest of the green woodpecker than by scanning the ground in the presumed locality, for the tree which holds the nest is always recognizable by the chips scattered at its foot. The three species just mentioned are the only woodpeckers that inhabit Britain, though several others are mistakenly recorded as occurring in the country—and especially the great black woodpecker, the Picus martins of See also:Linnaeus, which must be regarded as the type of that genus.' This See also:fine species considerably exceeds the green woodpecker in size, and except. for its red cap is wholly black. It is chiefly an inhabitant of the See also:fir forests of the Old World, from See also:Lapland to See also:Galicia and across See also:Siberia to See also:Japan. In North America this species is replaced by Picus pileatus, there generally known as the logcock, an equally fine species, but variegated with white; and farther to the southward occur two that are finer still, P. principalis, the See also:ivory-billed woodpecker and P. imperialis. The Picinae indeed flourish in the New World, nearly one-See also:half of the described species being See also:American, but of the large number that inhabit See also:Canada and the See also:United States we can mention only a few. First of these is the Californian woodpecker, Melanerpes formicivorus, which has been said to display an amount of See also:providence beyond almost any other bird in the number of acorns it fixes tightly in holes which it makes in the bark of trees, and thus " a large See also:pine See also:forty or fifty feet high will present the See also:appearance of being closely studded with See also:brass nails, the heads only being visible." This is not done to furnish food in See also:winter, for the species migrates, and only returns in spring to the forests where its supplies are laid up. It has been asserted that the acorns thus stored are always those which contain a maggot, and, being fitted into the sockets pre-pared for them See also:cup-end foremost, the enclosed See also:insects are unable to See also:escape, as they otherwise would, and are thus ready for See also:consumption by the birds on their return from the See also:south. But this statement has again been contradicted, and, moreover, it is alleged that these woodpeckers follow their See also:instinct so blindly that " they do not distinguish between an See also:acorn and a pebble," so that they " fill up the holes they have drilled with so much labor, not only with acorns but occasionally with stones " (cf. See also:Baird, See also:Brewer and Ridgway, North American Birds, ii. pp. 569-571). The next North-American form deserving See also:notice is the genus Cola pies, represented in the north and See also:east by C. auratus, the See also:golden-winged woodpecker or flicker, in most parts of the country a See also:familiar bird, but in the south and See also:west replaced by the allied C. mexicanus, easily distinguishable among other characteristics by having the shafts of its quills red instead of yellow. It is curious, however, that, in the valleys of the upper See also:Missouri and Yellowstone See also:rivers, where the range of the two kinds overlaps, birds are found presenting an extraordinary mixture of the otherwise distinctive features of each. Other North American forms are the downy and hairy wood-peckers, small birds with spotted black and white plumage, which are very valuable as destroyers of harmful grubs and borers; the red-headed woodpecker, a very handsome form with strongly contrasted red, black and white plumage, common west of the See also:Alleghany Mountains; and the yellow-bellied woodpecker (" sapsucker "). Some other woodpeckers deserve especial notice—the Colaptes or Soroplex campestris, which inhabits the treeless plains of See also:Paraguay and La See also:Plata; also the South-See also:African woodpecker Geocolaptes olivaceus, which lives almost entirely on the ground or rocks, and picks a hole for its nest in the See also:bank of a stream (Zoologist, 1882, p. 208). The woodpeckers, together with the wrynecks (q.v.), form a very natural See also:division of scansorial birds with zygodactylous feet, and were regarded by T. H. See also:Huxley as forming a distinct division of birds to which he gave the name Celeomorphae, whilst W. K. See also:Parker separated them from all other birds as Saurognathae. (A. Additional information and CommentsThere are no comments yet for this article.
» Add information or comments to this article.
Please link directly to this article:
Highlight the code below, right click, and select "copy." Then paste it into your website, email, or other HTML. Site content, images, and layout Copyright © 2006 - Net Industries, worldwide. |
|
|
[back] WOODFORD |
[next] WOODS, LEONARD (1774-1854) |