CAPE GILDED FLICKER

HABITS

Because Malherbe’s name was given to the first gilded flicker to be described, and because his type came from the Cape region of Baja California, this race becomes the type race of the species. Its range extends from about latitude 28° N. to the southern extremity of Baja California. It is about the same size as its nearest relative to the northward, brunnescens, but is decidedly lighter in coloration. It is smaller than mearnsi and somewhat darker in coloration.

William Brewster (1902) says of its haunts: “Mr. Belding and Mr. Frazar agree as to the rarity of the Gilded Flicker on the higher mountains, where only a few individuals were seen by the former, and but two (both females, taken on the Sierra de la Laguna, April 29) obtained by the latter. The bird’s true home is evidently at the bases of the mountains, and among the foothills extending thence to the shores of the Pacific on the south and west, and to the Gulf on the east. Throughout this region it is a common species, although not so numerously represented as Melanerpes uropygialis. On the arid plains near the coast it breeds in the stems of the giant cactus.”

Griffing Bancroft (1930) says of this species in central Baja California, south of latitude 28°:

The birds are extremely wild, often flushing from a distance of a quarter of a mile. They lay in old cavities and, probably, also in those that are new; scarred sahuaro dries so rapidly that a definite determination on this point was not possible. The nests are usually twenty feet or more above the ground and the cavities are generous; an eight-inch diameter and a two-foot depth are not unusual. Occasionally they will use natural openings in the cardón or holes that have been chopped open by honey gatherers.

The flickers lay from early April until well into June. The number of eggs in a clutch is normally three. With the single exception of one set of five we found none larger, and none smaller in which incubation had commenced.

The eggs of the Cape gilded flicker are apparently similar to those of other flickers, except in size. Mr. Bancroft (1930) gives the measurements of 18 eggs as averaging 26.3 by 20.9 millimeters. The measurements of 8 other eggs average 28.49 by 21.15 millimeters; the eggs, in this series, showing the four extremes measure 31.35 by 21.83, 30.15 by 22.22, 25.90 by 20.70, and 26.70 by 20.00 millimeters.

Its habits in general are apparently similar to those the gilded flicker of Arizona, on which more has been published, and the reader is referred to the following account of Colaptes chrysoides mearnsi.

DISTRIBUTION

Range.—Southern Arizona, southeastern California, and northwestern Mexico; nonmigratory.

The range of the gilded flicker extends north to extreme southeastern California (Duncan Flats); and southern Arizona (Antelope Peak, Bigbug, and the Salt River Bird Reservation). East to southeastern Arizona (Salt River Bird Reservation, Desert Wells, Picacho, Oracle, and Tombstone); central Sonora (Magdalena, Opodepe, Hermosillo, Cedros, and Camoa); and central Sinaloa (Culiacan). South to Sinaloa (Culiacan); and southern Baja California (Cape San Lucas). West to Baja California (Cape San Lucas, Todos Santos, Triunfo, Santa Margarita Island, San Javier, San Quintin, and the Alamo River); and southeastern California (Duncan Flats).

The range as outlined is for the entire species, which has been separated into three geographic races. The typical race, known as the Cape gilded flicker (C. c. chrysoides), is found in the Cape district of Baja California and north to about latitude 28° N. The San Fernando flicker (C. c. brunnescens) occurs only within a range of two degrees latitude in Baja California (lat. 28° to 30° N.). Mearns’s gilded flicker (C. c. mearnsi) is the race found in the southwestern United States, northwestern Baja California, and the mainland of Mexico.