A Furtive Stranger
For the second time recently a bird of the same species has been sent to me for identification. The later victim came from Devonshire. It was seen and much admired one day as it ran up the trunk of a fig-tree in the garden. The next day the poor little thing was found dead in the back-yard. The reason for its collapse was not traced. The other bird was found close to a church on a Hertfordshire common, and it was inferred that it had flown against one of the windows. The birds were both Lesser Spotted Woodpeckers, the Devon- shire one in its first youth, showing its lack of development chiefly in the beak. The plumage was peculiarly bright and complete in colour. I think the doubt arose because it is very much smaller than people expect a woodpecker to be ; and it is rarely seen, for it prefers woodlands and has rather more furtive ways than other woodpeckers. It is not so rare as is generally thought. The one nest I have known of this year is in an easily observed plum-tree in a Worcestershire orchard, where the hard work of the cock-bird in digging out the nesting-hole was much admired by a constant observer.
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