174 



ELEMENTARY STUDIES IN INSECT LIFE 



the dragon-fly is disturbed it will fly away, to return 

 shortly. This trait furnishes excellent opportunities 

 for taking its picture in its native haunts. The perch 

 discovered, the camera can be set and focused ; when all 

 is quiet the insect will return, and the mere pressure 

 of the bulb furnishes a plain picture such as this pho- 

 tograph, taken in a similar way. 



The dragon-fly's biogra- 

 phy, could it tell it, would 

 be full of strange incidents 

 and hairbreadth escapes. 

 It comes from a tiny egG', 

 dropped alone in some large 

 pond to hatch and grow. 

 Two problems at once are 

 presented - - to secure a live- 

 lihood and to escape its hos- 

 tile water neighbors, among 

 them the fish and other 

 members of its kind, both 

 ready to feed upon it. It 

 first lives upon micro-organ- 

 isms of the water, but later 

 becomes much larger and stronger and able to capture 

 " wigglers " such as are to be found in rain-barrels. 

 Its under lip is well adapted for this work; it is 

 scoop-shaped, capable of extending and scooping in a 

 wiggler and then drawing the catch up to the mouth, 

 where the jaws make short work of it. (Fig. 139). And 

 if perchance alone and unaided it has been able to 

 escape its enemies and secure enough food to bring it 



FIG. 138. Dragon-fly on the look- 

 out for prey. Photographed from 

 life. 



