The lizard obtains its food in a similar way. It enters the bungalow and lies up during the day behind a picture. As soon as the lamps are lighted it comes forth as hungry as the proverbial hunter. In a single night it devours hundreds of insects. I have watched a lizard feeding in this way until he had consumed so many insects that he could scarcely move: and doubtless he would have continued his gluttonous meal but for the fact that he had become as slow as Mark Twain’s jumping frog after it had partaken copiously of shot! The lizard cannot shoot out his tongue to the extent that the frog can, so he has to make a dash at each insect before swallowing, and, to his credit, it must be said that he rarely lets a victim escape him unless, of course, he has over-eaten himself.
Although I am very fond of the nimble little gecko, I must admit that he is an out-and-out glutton. Sometimes his gluttony leads him to try to capture quarry beyond his capacity. Let me relate an amusing little incident that I recently witnessed. The scene was my dressing-table, and the time 9 p.m. in the month of August; the day I forget. It matters not. A large stag-beetle was crawling laboriously across the dressing-table. Upon this table was an ordinary looking-glass, under which a lizard had taken up his habitation. From his point of view the position was a good one, for the lamp overhead attracted to the table a number of insects which the lizard could watch from under the base of the glass.
The lizard caught sight of the beetle and began to stalk it. Surely, I thought, the lizard will not try to devour that beetle, which is nearly half as big as himself; but, as he emerged from under the glass, I saw that he meant business. Slowly but surely he gained upon the slow-moving beetle. Having arrived close up behind it, he shot forth his sticky tongue. The next moment the beetle found itself lying on a spot eight inches from where it had a second before stood, and the lizard was trembling in his lair. The reptile had apparently expected to find the beetle as soft and luscious as a strawberry, so the instant his tongue felt the hard, chitinous integument of the beetle he drew that organ back pretty smartly. But his tongue was so sticky that the beetle stuck to it for a moment, and so was thrown backwards over the reptile’s head. The lizard was startled at what had happened, so instinctively took cover. The insect too was scared nearly out of its wits, and did what most frightened insects do, that is to say, retracted its legs and remained perfectly motionless. When, however, several minutes passed and nothing happened, the beetle grew bold, and putting forth its legs, began again to crawl on its way. Directly it moved the lizard put himself on the qui vive, and even went so far as again to follow it, but, profiting by his recent experience, did not attempt a second time to swallow it. Thus the beetle passed off the stage.
Seeing that this particular lizard was not over sharp, I determined to play a little practical joke upon it. Taking a piece of black worsted, I rolled it up into a ball about the size of a fine, strapping blue-bottle fly, and, having attached a piece of cotton to it, I dangled this bait before the lizard. I succeeded in “drawing” him. He was on it before I could say “knife.”
In less than a second the worsted was in his mouth, but he dropped it like a hot potato, and then sulked under the looking-glass, apparently greatly annoyed at having been made a fool of twice in succession. The next day I chanced to come upon a toad, busy catching insects. Wondering whether he would be deceived, I threw on to the grass near him the end of a lighted cigarette which I had been smoking. He at once caught sight of it, and sat there looking at it intently for some seconds, and I began to think he would not fall into the trap, but the temptation was too strong, for he shot forth his tongue to seize it. He discovered that the “tongue is an unruly member” as he retracted the smarting organ.
It is therefore clear that some insect-hunters are ever ready to try experiments as regards food.
Fish too, when really hungry, do not appear to exercise much discrimination as to the nature of the “fly” they will take.
The swarming of the “white ants” is a red-letter day for the insect-eating animals, an annual harvest in which they revel. The mynas and the crows do not disdain to partake of this copious meal supplied by nature.
The latter are omnivorous birds; all is grist which comes to their mill—carrion, fruit, locusts, termites, fish, grain, and the crumbs which fall from man’s table.
The mynas too eat a variety of food, but they are first and foremost insectivorous birds. They are never so happy as when chasing grasshoppers on the grass. By preference they accompany cattle, strutting along beside these and catching in their beaks the insects as these latter jump into the air, frightened by the approach of the great quadruped.