What wader, be he boy or water-fowl, has not watched the water-insects? How they dart hither and thither, some skimming the surface, others sturdily rowing about in the clear shallows! The sunlight fastens, for an instant, their grotesque reflections on the smooth bottom, then away—the shadow is lost, except for the picture it left in the memory of the onlooker.
The splashing, dashing wader, with his shout and his all-disturbing stick, stands but a poor chance of making intimate acquaintances among water-folk. Your true brook-lover is a quiet individual except when occasion demands action. The lad who, from the vantage ground of a fallen log or overhanging bank, looks down on the housekeeping affairs of his tiny neighbors has the right spirit. Indeed, I doubt whether these little folk are aware of his presence or curiosity.
Time was when the enjoyment of brook-life was limited to boys. White aprons, dainty slippers and fear of being called "Tom-boy" restrained the natural impulses of the "little women." Happily that day is past, and it no longer looks queer for girls to live in the open air and sunshine, free to chase butterflies and hunt water-bugs with their brothers.
My brooks abound in swift eddies, perfect whirlpools in miniature, and water-falls of assorted sizes. They have also their quiet reaches, where whirligig beetles perform their marvelous gyrations, and bright-eyed polliwogs twirl their tails in early May. On the banks are ferns and mosses; sometimes willows and alders form a fringing border.
The heart-leaved willows along many brooksides are found to bear at the tips of many of their branches, knob-like bodies which look like pine cones. ([Fig. 49].) Now everybody knows that willows bear their seeds in catkins. Why, then, should so many brookside willows thrust these cones in our faces? On cutting one of the cones open, we learn the secret. A tiny colorless grub rolls helplessly out of a cell in the very centre of the cone. It is the young of a small gnat, scarcely larger than a mosquito, and known as a "gall gnat." The cone-shaped body on the willow branch is called a "pine-cone willow-gall." The little gray gnat comes out in the spring. Any one can collect the galls from the willows and keep them in some kind of cage in the house until the gnats come forth.
Fig. 49. Knob-like bodies resembling pine cones.
The pine-cone gall is an enlarged and deformed bud. The twig might have developed into a branch but for the presence of the little larva. The scales of the cone are the parts which under more favorable conditions would have been leaves. The brook-lover cannot afford to miss the pine-cone willow-galls.
Wandering along the brookside in spring or early summer, one is surprised to find so many insect visitors darting about in the air. There are dragon-flies of many shapes, sizes and colors; dainty damsel-flies perch airily on reeds, their gleaming wings a-flutter in the sunshine; sometimes a nervous mud-wasp alights for a moment, and then up and away. The dragon-flies seem intent on coming as near to the water as possible without wetting their wings. They pay no heed to other visitors, yet how easily they escape the net of the would be collector! Let them alone. Their business is important if we would have a new generation of dragon-flies to delight the eye next year. The eggs of these creatures are left in the water and the young ones are aquatic. If you would know more of them, dip down into the stream in some sluggish bay. Dip deep and trail the net among the water plants. Besides dragon-fly nymphs there will be caddice-worm cases like tiny cob-houses, water-boatmen, back-swimmers, and giant water-bugs.[14] These are insects characteristic of still or sluggish water, and are found in spring and summer.