ELEMENTARY STUDIES IN INSECT LIFE 



The grasshopper,* which has been selected to illus- 

 trate incomplete metamorphosis, spends the cold win- 

 ter days as an embryo, in an egg snch as shown in 

 Figure 3, along with a hundred or more similar eggs 

 in a pod laid in the ground the previous fall by the 

 mother insect. These eggs quietly await the warmth of 

 spring to bring them to life. 



FIG. 3. Eggs of the yellow grasshopper (Melanoplus diffcrentialis). Enlarged. 



The young insect, soon works its way to the surface, 

 where food is sought for strength and growth ; and as 

 it grows it assumes new forms and new garments. This 

 change of clothing, or shedding of skin, more properly 

 called molting, takes place a number of times during 

 its youth. The most interesting molt is the last one, 

 the one in which the grasshopper brings out fully de- 

 veloped wings from the wing-pads in the skin which is 

 being cast off. The observations recounted in this chap- 

 ter were made in a cornfield ; and from sketches taken 



* The yellow grasshopper, Melanoplus diffcrentiaUs. 



