WEAK FISH (Otolithus Regalis).
it accumulates on the head or body? Why should new insects year after year make a perpetually changing warfare against the farmer’s crops in gradation with the exhaustion of the soil? Why should the Hessians bring the Hessian fly, or vice versa, as you please? And a great many other Whys which never have been and never will be answered till the “heavens shall be rolled up as a scroll.”
Insects feed voraciously on leaves, vegetables, fruit, on human blood—sad to relate—and fortunately on one another. Mosquitoes, thank Heaven, have parasites that cling to the delicate rings of their bodies, stinging the arch-stinger, and inflicting by their venomous bites the same agonies the sufferers inflict on others. It is to be hoped those gentlemen will increase and multiply, and after exterminating mosquitoes may pay their addresses to the black gnats. Certain families, especially of the coleoptera, emit a species of phosphorescent light in the dark, occasionally light enough to read by. The majority of insects have wings, but many have not, and in some only one gender is winged. A few kinds, such as the locusts, katydids, crickets, death-ticks, emit sounds, to which man’s sympathies have added either a pleasant or painful association, and produce these peculiar cries generally by rubbing the wings or some part of the body. The wings of insects do not exceed four, and are often limited to two; their legs are six; some have antennæ or feelers, others long whisks from their tails.
The neuroptera, or net-winged insects, florfliegen, gauze-flies, as they are called by the Germans, include the principal pets of the fly-fisher. Their bodies are long, tapering and delicate; their wings, four, almost transparent and marked with net-like veins. They keep in continual motion for the purpose of catching smaller insects, on which they mainly feed, and generally deposit their eggs in the water, where the grubs live from one to two years on plants or other insects.
That most fearful looking, but really harmless and beneficent creature, the devil’s darning-needle, or dragon-fly, libellula, is a remarkable specimen of this family. They are called demoiselles by the French, wasserjunfern, water-virgins by the Germans; but, in spite of these pretty appellations, are the tyrants of the surface of the ponds; they seize and tear to pieces all other insects, including butterflies and mosquitoes, and will clear a house of the common fly. They are cruel, rapacious and insatiable, and I do not know of their ever being used as bait for trout.
The phryganea, or water-moth, is one of the favorites of the fly-fisher. Its grubs surround themselves with a case formed of wood or grass, and are used by him as bait under the name of caddis-worms. They are the favorite food of the trout in early spring. But the ephemeridæ include most of the specimens imitated by the fisherman. The larvæ of these live in the water, for one or more years, and then, swimming to the surface, suddenly change into winged insects, delicate and beautiful. They sometimes appear in myriads, their dead bodies covering the water. A few make a second change after flying about for a time, and crawl out of their skins once more, leaving their old clothes, to all appearance perfect, sticking to a tree or fence. On their first appearance they are said to be in the pseudimago state, and to them the name duns is applied by the fly-fisher; when they change to the imago or perfect fly, they are called piscatorially spinners. There are exceptions to this uniformity, as with the May-flies; the green drake is the pseudimago, and the grey drake the imago.
The phryganidæ and ephemeridæ are easily distinguished; in the former the wings lie close along the back, projecting beyond the body; the antennæ or feelers are long, and there are no whisks; in the latter the wings stand upright from the body like a butterfly’s, the antennæ are very short, and there are two, or occasionally three, long delicate whisks.
The phryganidæ attach their eggs to the foliage overhanging the water, whence upon hatching the larvæ fall, and immediately proceed to construct, of twigs or gravel, miniature houses like a snail’s shell, where they reside in peace and safety. These cases are lined with silk, spun from the insect’s mouth, and are so light as not seriously to impede its swimming and rambling in search of food, and being open at both ends, allow him a view of the outside world. The larvæ live mainly on aquatic plants, and when the proper time arrives, they close the ends of their houses with a species of grating, and commence the dormant state of the pupa. In this they remain a few days, and then emerging from their case, they ascend to the surface, burst their skin, and fly away in their perfect state of beauty.
The ephemeridæ deposit their eggs in the water, where they soon hatch, and where the grub, which lives usually on clay or vegetable matter, resides, occasionally for several years, hiding under stones or in holes in the mud. It then becomes a pupa, and after accomplishing its time, rises to the surface, throws off its skin, and flies away, bearing the name of dun; it shortly alights on a tree or fence, and sheds its entire skin, withdrawing even its delicate wings and minute whisks from their previous covering. Its colors in the second stage are usually more brilliant, and under the name spinner it enjoys the pleasures of life, perpetuates its species and dies in a few hours. While laying its eggs, it will be noticed either resting on the water or floating up and down over it. Certain species can swim well under water, and I believe descend to the bottom to deposit their eggs. I have had numbers alight on my pants when I was wading a rapid stream, run down my legs to the bottom, crawl over the stones, and with a zig-zag motion swim against the current to the surface. Rocks are frequently seen darkened with flies, that on any sudden approach drop into the water and disappear.