Little Brothers of the Air

by Olive Thorne Miller

I eagerly demanded his name, and was delighted to hear in answer, "The sapsucker." I was delighted because I hoped to see for myself whether the bird merited the offensive name bestowed upon him, or was the victim of hasty generalization from careless observation or insufficient data, like others of his race. The close investigations of scientific men have reversed many popular decisions. They have proved the crow to be the farmer's friend, most of the hawks and owls to be laborers in his interest, the kingbird to fare almost entirely upon destructive insects rather than bees, and other birds to be more sinned against than sinning.

The first thing noted was the sapsucker's peculiar food-seeking habit. One bird made the lawn a daily haunt, and we, living chiefly on the veranda, saw him before us at all hours, from dawn to dusk, and thus had the best possible chance to catch him in mischief, if to mischief he inclined. He generally made his appearance flying in bounding, wave-like fashion, uttering his loud mournful cry, which, though an apparent wail, was evidently not inspired by sadness. Alighting near the foot of a tree-trunk, with many repetitions of his complaining note, he gayly bobbed his way up the bark highway as if it were a ladder. When he reached the branches, he flew to another tree. This bird's custom of delivering his striking call as he approached and mounted a tree not far from his "food tree" may be a newly acquired habit; for Dr. Merriam, who observed this species ten years ago on the same place, says that he "never heard a note of any description from them, either while in the neighborhood of these trees, or in flying to and fro between them and the forests." On his own trees the sapsucker was not in such haste, but lingered about the prepared rings, evidently taking his pick of the insects attracted there.

The array of traps prepared for the woodpecker's use was most curious, and readily explained how he came by his name. The clever little workman had selected for his purpose two trees. One was a large elm, and around its trunk, about fifteen feet from the ground, he had laboriously cut with his sharp beak several rings of cups. These receptacles were somewhat less than half an inch in diameter, and nearly their own width apart, and the rings encircled the trunk as regularly as though laid out with mechanical instruments. His second depot of supplies was one of a close group of mountain ashes, which seemed to spring from one root, and were thickly shaded by leaves to the ground. The elm would naturally attract the high-flying insects, and the ash those which stay nearer the earth, though I do not presume to say that was the bird's intention in so arranging them. The mountain-ash trunk was perforated in a different way from the elm, the holes being in lines up and down, and the whole trunk covered five or six feet above the root. These places were not at all moist or sticky on the several occasions when I examined them, and both trees were in a flourishing condition.

The habit of the author of this elaborate arrangement was to fly from one tree to the other almost constantly. It appeared to lookers-on that he visited the traps on one and secured whatever was caught or lingered there, then went to the other for the same purpose; thus allowing insects a chance to settle on each while he was absent. At almost any hour of the day he could be found vigorously carrying on his insect hunt in this singular fashion.

It was too late in the season to see the sapsucker in his most frolicsome humor, although occasionally we met in the woods two of them in a lively mood, eagerly discussing in garrulous tones their own private affairs, or chasing each other with droll, taunting cries, some of which resembled the boy's yell, "oy-ee," but others defied description. During courtship, observes Dr. Merriam, they are inexpressibly comical, with queer rollicking ways and eccentric pranks, making the woods ring with their extraordinary voices. At this time, early in June, the season of woodpecker wooing was past. Each little couple had built a castle in the air, and set up a household of its own, somewhere in the woods surrounding the house.

The two storehouses on the lawn seemed to belong to one family, whose labor alone had prepared them; certainly they were the property of the sapsuckers. But the bird world, like the human, has its spoilers. A frequent visitor to the elm, on poaching bent, was a humming-bird, who treated the beguiling cups like so many flowers, hovering lightly before them, and testing one after another in regular order. The owner naturally objected, and if present flew at the dainty robber; but the elusive birdling simply moved to another place, not in the least awed by his comparatively clumsy assailant. Large flies, perhaps bees also, buzzed around the tempting bait, and doubtless many paid with their lives for their folly.

The most unexpected plunderer of the sapsucker stores was a gray squirrel, who lay spread out flat against the trunk as though glued there, body, arms, legs, and even tail, with head down and closely pressed against the bark. I cannot positively affirm that he was sucking the sap or feeding upon the insects attracted to it, but it is a fact that his mouth rested exactly over one of the rings of holes; and his position seemed very satisfactory, for some reason, for he hung there motionless so long that I began to fear he was dead. All these petty pilferers may possibly have regarded the treasure as nature's own provision, like the flowers, but one visitor to his neighbor's magazine certainly knew better. This was the brilliant cousin of the sapsucker, the red-headed woodpecker, whose vagaries I shall speak of a little later.

Nothing about the tri-colored family is more interesting than its habit of drumming,—

"The ceaseless rap
Of the yellow-hammer's tap,
Tip-tap, tip-tap, tip-tap-tip.
'Tis the merry pitter-patter
Of the yellow-hammer's tap."