Plate XXVII. Male and Female.
Head and neck bright crimson, that colour descending on the fore neck, and margined with a semilunar band of black; back wings and tail glossy bluish-black; inner secondaries, rump, and lower parts, pure white. Young with the head and neck brownish-grey, streaked with dusky; feathers of back and wing-coverts dusky, edged with grey; secondary quills yellowish-white barred with black; lower parts greyish-white, the sides streaked with dusky.
Male, 9, 17. Female, 81/2.
Breeds from Texas to Nova Scotia, and throughout the interior to the head waters of the Missouri; thence to Lake Huron. Extremely common. Great numbers spend the winter in Louisiana.
Red-headed Woodpecker, Picus erythrocephalus, Wils. Amer. Orn. v. i. p. 142.
Picus erythrocephalus, Bonap. Syn. p. 45.
Melanerpes erythrocephalus, Red-headed Woodpecker, Swains. & Rich. F. Bor. Amer. v. ii. p. 316.
Red-headed Woodpecker, Picus erythrocephalus, Aud. Orn. Biog. v. i. p. 141; v. v. p. 536.
275. 20. Picus torquatus, Wils. Lewis's Woodpecker.
Plate CCCCXVI. Fig. 7. Male. Fig. 8. Female.
Upper parts black, highly glossed with dark green; a band across the forehead, the chin, and a broad patch on the side of the head, surrounding the eye, deep carmine, or blood-red; beyond this, the throat and part of the sides of the neck black; a band of dull white across the hind neck, continuous anteriorly with a large patch of yellowish-white, occupying the fore neck and part of the breast; the rest of the breast and the sides bright red; lower wing-coverts, abdomen, and lower tail-coverts black. Young with the red on the head scarcely apparent, that on the lower parts mixed with greyish-white, the fore part of the neck dull grey, and the white ring on the hind neck wanting; many of the feathers there with one or two white spots near the end.
Male, 11, wing, 72/12.
Rocky Mountains, and Columbia River. Abundant. Migratory.