LOWER CALIFORNIA HAIRY WOODPECKER
HABITS
Laurence M. Huey (1927) who described and named this woodpecker, characterized it as “similar to Dryobates villosus hyloscopus Cabanis and Heine, but decidedly smaller. In fully adult birds, the dusky white of the breast extends farther down on the breast than does that on examples from the northern mountains.” He gives, as its range, “the pine clad slopes of the Sierra Juarez and Sierra San Pedro Martir, Lower California, Mexico. * * * The range of this southern race does not extend north of the International Boundary, as specimens examined from the mountains of San Diego County, California, are in no way inclined toward the race D. v. scrippsae, but are counterparts of typical D. v. hyloscopus from the northern localities. In fact, the only variation that could point toward a ‘blending’ is found in the Sierra Juarez birds, but their average falls so near that of the birds from the Sierra San Pedro Martir that the name proposed herewith should apply.”
This southern race probably does not differ materially in its habits from other hairy woodpeckers, except in so far as it is affected by its environment.