DRYOBATES VILLOSUS PICOIDEUS Osgood
QUEEN CHARLOTTE WOODPECKER
HABITS
Dr. Wilfred H. Osgood (1901) described the hairy woodpecker of the Queen Charlotte Islands, as a full species, Dryobates picoideus. He says it can be distinguished from all other members of the villosus group by the black markings on the back and characterizes it as “similar in general to Dryobates v. harrisi; bill slightly smaller; middle of back barred and spotted with black; flanks streaked with black.” He says that this woodpecker is not abundant on the islands; during a period of over a month spent in active collecting he saw only six, all of which were collected.
I cannot find that anything has been published on the habits of the Queen Charlotte woodpecker, which probably do not differ essentially from those of harrisi, to which it is closely related and which inhabits a similar, humid coast environment. There are a number of skins of this race in various collections, but, so far as I know, no authentic eggs have ever found their way into any American collection. Very little exploration has been done in the interior of the Queen Charlotte Islands, and we know very little about the habits of its birds.
DRYOBATES VILLOSUS TERRAENOVAE Batchelder
NEWFOUNDLAND WOODPECKER
HABITS
Charles F. Batchelder (1908), who discovered and described this race of the hairy woodpecker, characterized it as—
Similar to typical Dryobates villosus, but slightly larger, the black areas of the upper parts increased, the white areas reduced both in number and in size, especially in the remiges and wing coverts. * * * Dryobates villosus terraenovae is much smaller than D. v. leucomelas, and is, of course, even more remote from it in coloring than from true villosus. Between it and D. v. hyloscopus and D. v. monticola there is a striking resemblance in coloring, but the wide area—occupied throughout its extent either by villosus or by leucomelas—that intervenes between the ranges of these two Western subspecies and that of terraenovae, precludes the possibility of immediate intergradation, while the utter dissimilarity of the climatic conditions of their respective habitats forbids the supposition that like causes in environment have developed like characters; apparently this is a case where superficial resemblances have arisen entirely independently of climatic influences.