I may not be as pretty a bird as my red-headed cousin but I'm just as
busy. My home is in the west among the pines on the mountains. I do not
visit the east at all.
Of course I like insects and fruits just as my relations do, but I like
best to eat acorns. You know, if I left the acorns on the trees and just
got enough to eat at one time, after a while I would have a hard time
finding any. They would drop off and roll away and get lost among the
leaves and grasses. What would you do if you were I?
I have a very sharp bill, you see. So I can peck and peck at the tree
until I have made a hole which will hold an acorn. Sometimes I fill my
store house quite full in this way. You can see how they look in the
picture. When I want to get at the meat in the acorn I drive the nut
into a crack and split the shell. Then I have my breakfast easily
enough.
Some of the other birds like acorns too--but I think they should find
and store away their own and not try to take mine. I do not like to
quarrel and so have many friends.
Then I have my nest to look after. I make it as my cousin does, by
digging into a tree, first a passage way or hall--then a living-room.
There are the four or five white eggs and there too soon are the little
baby-birds to be taken care of. Now, have I not a great deal of work? Do
you not think I am quite as busy as my cousin?
[Illustration: From col. Chi. Acad. Sciences.
CALIFORNIA WOODPECKER.]