The beak, however, is not so
straight or so strong as in the typical woodpeckers but it is strong enough
to bore into wood. Hence this Colaptes, in all the essential parts of its
structure, is a woodpecker. Even in such trifling characters as the
colouring, the harsh tone of the voice, and undulatory flight, its close
blood-relationship to our common woodpecker is plainly declared; yet, as I
can assert, not only from my own observations, but from those of the
accurate Azara, in certain large districts it does not climb trees, and it
makes its nest in holes in banks! In certain other districts, however,
this same woodpecker, as Mr. Hudson states, frequents trees, and bores
holes in the trunk for its nest. I may mention as another illustration of
the varied habits of this genus, that a Mexican Colaptes has been described
by De Saussure as boring holes into hard wood in order to lay up a store of
acorns.
Petrels are the most aerial and oceanic of birds, but, in the quiet sounds
of Tierra del Fuego, the Puffinuria berardi, in its general habits, in its
astonishing power of diving, in its manner of swimming and of flying when
made to take flight, would be mistaken by any one for an auk or a grebe;
nevertheless, it is essentially a petrel, but with many parts of its
organisation profoundly modified in relation to its new habits of life;
whereas the woodpecker of La Plata has had its structure only slightly
modified.
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