Aristotle, Second Part of THE HISTORY OF ANIMALS Complete

Translated by D'Arcy Wentworth Thompson.

Aristotle Bilingual Anthology  Studies  Aristotle in Print

II: 128 pages - You are on Page 110

There are other birds whose favourite food consists of insects found beneath the bark of trees; as for instance, the great and the small pie, which are nicknamed the woodpeckers. These two birds resemble one another in plumage and in note, only that the note of the larger bird is the louder of the two; they both frequent the trunks of trees in quest of food. There is also the greenpie, a bird about the size of a turtle-dove, green-coloured all over, that pecks at the bark of trees with extraordinary vigour, lives generally on the branch of a tree, has a loud note, and is mostly found in the Peloponnese. There is another bird called the 'grub-picker' (or tree-creeper), about as small as the penduline titmouse, with speckled plumage of an ashen colour, and with a poor note; it is a variety of the woodpecker.

There are other birds that live on fruit and herbage, such as the wild pigeon or ringdove, the common pigeon, the rock-dove, and the turtle-dove. The ring-dove and the common pigeon are visible at all seasons; the turtledove only in the summer, for in winter it lurks in some hole or other and is never seen. The rock-dove is chiefly visible in the autumn, and is caught at that season; it is larger than the common pigeon but smaller than the wild one; it is generally caught while drinking. These pigeons bring their young ones with them when they visit this country. All our other birds come to us in the early summer and build their nests here, and the greater part of them rear their young on animal food, with the sole exception of the pigeon and its varieties.

The whole genus of birds may be pretty well divided into such as procure their food on dry land, such as frequent rivers and lakes, and such as live on or by the sea.

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