Part 9

“This is a lucky find, boys,” said their uncle. “Great crested newts, and what beauties they are!”

The boys were surprised to see him take one of the newts out of the net in his hand. He turned them over and looked at them closely before putting them into the jar.

“Aren’t you afraid they will bite you, Uncle George?” Tom asked.

“No, they cannot bite, and for a very good reason. They have got no teeth. They are most harmless creatures.

“But we must be getting home, boys. We have done well for our first visit to the pond. I will tell you all about what we have found when we get home, and you must watch them closely for yourselves.”

“Are we going to keep all these animals?” Frank asked.

“We will keep them for a little while, so as to find out what we can about them, then we will put them in the pond again.”

Exercises on Lesson VII.

1. What did the boys find in the pond? 2. What other living things may be seen in ponds? Make a list of all the pond creatures you know. 3. Why do caddis “worms” build cases round themselves? 4. Can newts bite? Give reason.

VIII.—UNCLE GEORGE’S TANK.

Uncle George’s tank was very simple. It was made up of several large glass bells, such as the gardener uses for covering tender plants.

Each glass bell had a nob on the end of it. Uncle George got a large block of wood for each bell-jar. This block he hollowed out with a chisel.

He next bored a large hole in the centre of the hollow to hold the nob. Then he cut a piece of thick green cloth into a round shape, with a hole in its centre.

This piece of cloth was placed over the hollowed out part of the block, and the bell-jar, turned upside down, was placed in the block so that the glass nob fitted into the hole.

Uncle George fitted up four of these tanks and filled them with fresh water. The frog spawn was put into the first vessel. The next was for the newts. The third one held the caddis worms and some other curious creatures that had been found in the ditch.

In the fourth vessel were half a dozen pretty little fishes called stickle-backs, which the boys had caught in the brook.

Some water weeds and a few water snails or whelks were put into each vessel, except that with the frog spawn in it.

Every other morning Uncle George changed the water by means of a tube which he called a siphon.

This was a piece of lead pipe, about two feet long, and bent in the middle into the form of the letter U.

“The water weeds are very pretty,” said Frank.

“They are,” replied his uncle, “and they are also very useful. They help to keep the water pure. I should have to change the water every day if there were no weeds in it.

“The whelks also are most useful. They are the road-men of our ponds and streams. They eat up all the waste matter, and so keep the water clean and healthy.”

It was great fun feeding those little fishes. They were fed sometimes on raw meat chopped very fine, sometimes on little pieces of biscuit. At first they were very shy, but they soon got over that. In less than a week they were quite at home, and would come up to the top of the water and take tiny pieces of beef from the boys’ fingers.

They would swim after Frank’s finger as he drew it round the tank, and would even leap out of the water for food that was held out to them.

At times they darted about as if playing “hide and seek” among the water weeds.

By and by the boys noticed that every time one of the little fish darted at another, the three cruel spines rose up on his back, and that he was really trying to spear his neighbour.

One morning a dead stickle-back was found in the bottom of the tank. A few days later another little fish was picked out pale and stiff.

“They are killing one another,” said Frank. “What shall we do?”