The Insect Folk

Part 1

Produced by Joseph R. Hauser, Janet Blenkinship and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net

The Insect Folk

MARGARET WARNER MORLEY

AUTHOR OF "SEED-BABIES," "FLOWERS AND THEIR FRIENDS" "LITTLE WANDERERS," ETC.

ILLUSTRATED BY THE AUTHOR

BOSTON, U.S.A. GINN & COMPANY, PUBLISHERS 1903

COPYRIGHT, 1903, BY MARGARET WARNER MORLEY

All rights reserved

A WORD TO THE CHILDREN

DEAR CHILDREN,--The very best way to know the insects is to go and watch them. Watch them whenever you can, and each time you will find out something new. Books will help you, but you must watch, too. Look more than you read.

If you need to catch them, put them under a tumbler, and feed them and give them a drop of water every day to drink. Slip a card under the rim of the tumbler on one side so as to let in the air. If you do not know what to feed them, or if they will not eat, let them go after a day or two.

If you wish to kill an injurious insect, do it quickly and completely. Remember the insects are alive, and we should not make them suffer unnecessarily.

Of course you must try to make your captives feel at home. If they live in the sand, put sand in the tumbler and tie a piece of netting over the top so they cannot escape.

If they live in the water, put them in a tumbler of water. And when you have secured your captives, watch them as much as you can.

If you do not know how to pronounce the words in this book, study the glossary at the back and it will help you.

I hope you will have a very happy time getting acquainted with your little insect neighbors.

MARGARET WARNER MORLEY.

BOSTON, April 18, 1903.

CONTENTS PAGE

OUR PRETTY DRAGON FLIES 3

THE FAIRY MAY FLIES 25

THE STONE FLY FOLK 33

THE SILVER FISH 36

THE OLD COCKROACHES 41

NEIGHBOR WALKING STICK 52

THE GRASSHOPPER TRIBES 59

THE SHORTHORNED GRASSHOPPERS 61

THE LONGHORNED GRASSHOPPERS 81

Part 2

PRETTY KATYDIDS 94

THE CRICKET-LIKE GRASSHOPPERS 99

THE CHEERY CRICKET PEOPLE 101

A LARGE FAMILY 107

THE GREAT BUG FAMILY 115

THE WATER BOATMAN 116

THE FUNNY BACK-SWIMMERS 124

THE GIANT WATER BUG 125

LITTLE MRS. SHORE BUG 127

THE AIRY WATER STRIDERS 127

A QUEER FELLOW 129

THE WELL DRESSED LACE BUG 132

A BAD BUG 133

THE TROUBLESOME RED BUG 135

THE RAVENOUS CHINCH BUGS 138

THE WELL PROTECTED STINK BUG 139

THE LOUSE 142

BIRD LICE AND BOOK LICE 142

FRIEND CICADA 143

THE ODD SPITTLE INSECT 152

PRETTY LEAF HOPPERS 154

THE COMICAL TREE HOPPERS 157

THE JUMPING PLANT LICE 157

THE APHIDS 158

SCALE BUGS 165

THE HORNED CORYDALUS 175

FAIRY LACEWING 183

THE ANT LION 187

Part 3

THE LITTLE CADDICE FLIES 190

~ODONATA~

~EPHEMERIDA~

~PLECOPTERA~

~THYSANURA~

OUR PRETTY DRAGON FLIES

Come, children; come with me.

Come to a pond I know of.

See how the water shines in the sun.

Over there is an old log lying on the edge of the pond.

It is covered with green moss, and a green frog is sitting on one end of it.

Let us go and sit on the other end.

Goop! he says, and--plump! he has jumped into the water.

That is too bad, frog; we did not mean to disturb you.

How pretty it is here!

See the pickerel weed growing out in the water with its arrow-shaped leaves, and its spikes of purple flowers.

See, down in the water are little fish, and very likely pollywogs are there too, and lots of queer little things.

But who is this darting over the pond?

Ah, we know you.

You are our queer little, dear little old dragon fly.

Look, children; see the dragon flies darting about like flashes of light in every direction.

They are having such a good time.

Whizz! One flashed right past Mollie's ear.

Pretty people, I wish one of you would come and sit by us a little while, so we could get a good look at you.

What is that, Ned? You have found a large one lying on the ground?

Sure enough; it is a beauty too, with a green body and silver wings.

Something seems to be wrong with it; it does not fly nor try to get away.

What a big one it is!

Part 4

My! my! what eyes!

Don't crowd, Amy; let little Nell see too.

What is that you say, Richard? "It catches mosquitoes and gnats and flies and other insects while flying."

Yes, and that is why it has such big eyes. We should need big eyes ourselves if we were to spend our time chasing mosquitoes.

Two eyes you have, little dragon fly, like the rest of us, but your eyes are not like ours.

No, indeed!

Each of your big eyes is made up of a great many small eyes packed close together.

Do you know, children, that some of the largest of the dragon flies have as many as twenty thousand facets, or small eyes, in each large eye?

Think of it! Forty thousand eyes in one little dragon fly head. It ought to see well.

These facets are six-sided, excepting those along the edge, which are rounded on the outside. You cannot see their real shape without a microscope, they are so small. But here is a picture of some facets as they look under the microscope.

Eyes like these, made up of many facets, we call compound eyes.

All grown-up insects have compound eyes, though not many have as large ones as the dragon fly.

Only insects that chase other insects or that need to see in the dark have very large eyes.

See what a big mouth the dragon fly has. Its jaws do not show unless it opens its lower lip, which fits over its mouth like a mask.

I should not care to have it bite my finger.

It could not hurt very much, and its bite is not poisonous, still I shall handle it carefully.

Some call the dragon fly a darning needle, and say it sews up people's ears when they lie on the grass. This is not true. It does not sew up anything. It has nothing to sew with.

Why should it want to sew up people's ears, anyway?

It does nothing unpleasant but bite fingers, and it never goes out of its way to do that.

If we let it alone, it always lets us alone.

It is our good friend because it catches mosquitoes. For this reason it is sometimes called mosquito hawk.

We should never kill a dragon fly.

Sometimes it is called a spindle, I suppose because it is long and slender like a spindle.

Down South the colored people believe the dragon fly brings dead snakes to life, and they call it snake doctor.

In some places it is called snake feeder.

But it has nothing to do with snakes, dead or alive.

The French have given it a pretty name, demoiselle, or damsel fly, and that is quite deserved, for the dragon fly is a graceful little creature, as pretty as pretty can be.

See, sticking out of the front of its head are two little feelers, or antennae, as we must call them.

Part 5

They are very short, but it does not need long ones.

Insects smell with their feelers, you know, but our dragon flies see so well they do not need to smell very well, I suppose.

See how it can turn its head around. That is because it has a little short neck between its head and its body.

Its eyes, its mouth, and its antennae belong to its head.

Of course our demoiselle can fly well; one need only look at those wings to know that.

To fly well is quite as necessary to one of its habits as to see well.

What would be the use of seeing an insect if it could not fly fast enough to catch it?

We all like your pretty wings, little dragon fly; they look like glass and they shine so in the sun.

How fast the wings can move! See that dragon fly skimming over the pond; its wings make a whizzing sound as it darts about.

Why does it zigzag so?

Why doesn't it fly in a straight line?

Yes, Mollie, you are right, it goes zigzagging along after insects.

It sees one it wants off at one side--whizz! around it turns after it.

Shouldn't you like to fly like that, children?

And yet we would not be willing to exchange our arms and hands for wings.

We could not whittle a stick nor write a letter if we had only wings.

In fact we could not do most of the things we now do.

I am glad I have my hands.

We are glad, too, that the dragon flies have their pretty, swift wings.

They have four wings, all nearly the same size and shape, you see, and they are all stiff and shining.

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