Page:Condor12(6).djvu/23

 Nov., 1910 BIRD NOTES FROM SOUTHWESTERN MONTANA 201 The scarcity of squirrels is in turn probably caused by the lack of trees large enuf to furnish the seed these animals depend upon for winter food supply. Only a few of the nests near this camp were in good positions to obtain photo- graphs, but these few were quite near camp so that little of my limited time was lost, going and coming. In back of the stump containing the bird-fiat, was a large boulder which assisted in bringing the camera on a level with the Sapsucker's nest. This nest evidently contained eggs. The birds took turns at incubation and changed places frequently, but they were very wary of the camera and of me, so I gave it up until a Sunday, when there was plenty of time. On Saturday evening I went to the nest and set up a dummy camera, made of my tripod and camera case, leaving it over night to get the birds "camera broke", as one of my friends exprest it. The next morning I set up the real camera, and with the canvas cover of my bed-roll constructed a blind in a corner between two convenient boulders, connecting the blind and camera by a thred. Waiting here was not at all tiresome, for the Chickadees up stairs were feeding their young fre- quently and furnisht considerable enter- tainment. The male Sapsucker SOOll ap- peared to change places with his mate. The blind and camera made little differ- ence to him and I soon had my first pic- ture. I took severalpictures that morn- lug with little trouble except that I hall to leave the blind each time to change the film. The birds changed places regu- larly about once in half an hour. I had some difficulty in distinguishing the two birds, for the only mark of difference I could discern was a small patch of white on the chin and upper throat of the female, while the entire throat of the male was deep red. When leaving the nest to fly to a near- by tree, the birds often indulged in a peculiar flight entirely different from the usual one. In this flight the bird rises in ltig. 69. MOUNTAIN CHICKADEE V'ITI-I FOOD FOR VOUNG SHOWING FOUR POSES the air and hovers and flutters in a curious way. There was something familiar about it, as tho I had watcht it many times before. Finally as I was pondering this, a Solitaire rose in flight-song on the other side of the gulch and then I real- ized what it was. This flight of the woodpecker was the same as a song-flight in every way. The arch of the shoulders, the trembling of the wings, and the manner of spreading the tail were exactly the same; and the familiarity was caused by this flight combined with the black and white markings which made the bird, from where I viewed it, resemble a male Bobolink. On the opposite side of camp from this nest was a thick grove of aspen, and here one day I discovered a Sapsucker, probably one of the same pair, engaged in drinking sap from the aspens. Series of holes had been drilled into numbers of these aspens, usually near the top of the tree where the diameter was but an inch or two. The holes here were all fresh, but not far away I found more aspens, alders and willows that had been drilled, some of them apparently a good many years ago. I believe that these birds could hardly be considered very destructive in Montana, {or the trees they attack are all small ones and of very little value.