SUBFAMILY II. PSEUDOPH YLLIXvE. 



497 



as it dwells in small colonies in the 

 densest foliage which it can find, such 

 as the tops of shade and forest trees, 

 the entwining vines of the grape arbor, 

 the shrubbery of yards and orchards 

 and the trees along 1 fence rows. Its 

 note is the loudest made by any mem- 

 ber of the family, the male having the 

 musical organ larger and better devel- 

 oped than in any other. The call is al- 

 most always begun soon after dusk 

 with a single note uttered at intervals 

 of about five seconds for a half dozen 

 or more times. This preliminary note 

 gives the listener the impression that 

 the musician is tuning his instrument, 

 preparatory to the well-known double 

 call which is soon begun and kept up 

 almost continuously from dark till 

 dawn. Occasionally, in warm cloudy 

 weather, this call is made by day, and 

 if the musician is located he will some- 

 times be found resting on the topmost 

 leaf of a shrub, swinging to and fro 

 as the breezes blow, and sounding his cymbals in seeming unison 

 with the movement. This katydid reaches maturity in southern 

 Indiana by mid-July. The song has been heard in Crawford Coun- 

 ty as early as July 10, and as late as Oct. 27, and a single female 

 was captured in LaPorte County, near Lake Michigan, on Octo- 

 ber 15. 



In a Putnam County farmyard 1 listened for hours, one August 

 night, to the serenade of a baud of katydids. They seemingly tried 

 to outdo themselves for my benefit. But to them I was a nonen- 

 tity an unknown being. No thought of me or of my attentive 

 ear lurked in or passed through their brains, as they clashed their 

 cymbals in every shrub and tree around the old farm house. One 

 idea alone possessed the minds of the male musicians. That idea 

 was love passion "that greatest thing in the universe." Long 

 and loud the cymbals sounded, each shuffle, each note, doubtless 

 accompanied by the wish that the next would call from the skies, 

 from the branches above or about them from anywhere, it mat- 

 tered not one of their form and kind. One to whom they could 

 "whisper sweet nothings"- one whom they could caress tenderly 



Fig. 165. Male. Natural size. 

 (After Harris.) 



