THE THREAD-LEGGED BUG
(Emesa longipes, De G.)
When you consider how slight a jar of a spider’s web will bring its maker running swiftly across the web, it is interesting to be told that this thread-legged bug has the temerity to pick off insects from a spider’s web. It is plain that he stands on stilts, and with his powerful tong-like front legs, which end in spiny gripping hands, he must, I imagine, reach out across the web and pick the smaller insects from it, for he is much too small and weak and incredibly fragile to fight a spider on its own web.
Even to someone fairly familiar with the insect world he might easily be mistaken for a mantis, but his short, sharp beak, bent backwards under his chin, puts him among the bugs, where he takes his place beside the assassin bugs.
In one form of thread-legged bug in South America, it is said that the young larva is so long and slender that it curls itself around the mother’s body and is carried about with her, papoose-like, on her back.
THE ASSASSIN BUG
(Pselliopus cinctus, Fab.)