In its mode of nidification, the Wryneck resembles the Woodpeckers, selecting a hole in a tree wherein to deposit its eggs, which are six or seven in number, pure white, and laid with little or no attempt at a nest upon chips of decayed wood at the bottom of the hole. In about three weeks the young are hatched, and both parents take their turn at feeding them, bringing ants and their eggs in mouthfuls, woodlice, small spiders, and other insects. The ants, which are gathered up wholesale by means of the long glutinous tongue, which the bird darts amongst them with great rapidity, are stored up in the mouth until the return to the nest, when they are ejected in ball-like masses into the open gapes of the clamorous young. The latter quickly assume their feathers, and by the month of August are ready to leave the country with their parents _en route_ for Africa, Asia Minor, and India, where they pass the cold months of the year. But according to the observations of Lindermayer, Dr. Kruper, and others, many spend the winter in Greece amongst the olive groves, and Lord Lilford has seen it in Epirus in March and December (“Ibis,” 1860, p. 235).
In Tangiers, Tripoli, Algeria, Egypt, Nubia, and Abyssinia, it is by no means uncommon. It occurs also in Arabia, and according to Dr. Jerdon (“Birds of India,” vol. i. p. 303) is found throughout India, except, perhaps, on the Malabar Coast, where he never saw it, or heard of a specimen being procured. He adds, “It is chiefly, perhaps, a cold-weather visitant in the south of India; but it is found to remain all the year further north.”
I have already touched upon the question whether any of our summer migrants breed in their winter quarters, as well as in their summer haunts (see p. 41), and it may be well to note here the above remark of Dr. Jerdon, as well as the observation of Captain Loche, that the Wryneck breeds in the forests of Algeria. It of course remains to be shown whether the individuals which rear their young south of the Mediterranean, ever migrate into Europe; for it is possible that Algeria may be the northern-most limit in summer of those birds which have passed the winter many degrees further south than have the migrants from Europe.