ADAPTATIONS TO HAUNTS AND SEASONS 285 



often happens, a large assemblage of Anurida collects on 

 the surface of a rock-pool, the little creatures become 

 conspicuous at low water to a keen observer. The mass of 

 blackish springtails may be blown across the surface by the 

 wind, and some members of the crowd climb on to the backs 

 of others or do their best to clamber up the rocks among the 

 crevices and vegetation in which they appear to find their 

 normal homes and feeding-grounds. 



The Beetles (Coleoptera) are represented among marine 



Fig. 71. — a, Seashore Rove-beetle {Micralymma brevipenne), Western 

 Europe, X lo; &, larva ; c, pupa (ventral view), X 12. After Laboul- 

 b^ne (Ann. Soc. Etit. Fr. (3) vi, 1858). 



insects by a number of species belonging to several distinct 

 families. The zone of decaying seaweed at high- water 

 mark is the haunt of various rove-beetles (Staphylinidae) 

 which, with their grub^ feed on the fly-maggots that eat 

 the soft " wrack." Some members of this family live 

 between tide-marks ; the broad-bodied Micralymma hrevi- 

 penne (Fig. 71), with its reduced wings, may be found lurking 

 in rock-crevices or walking over shingle exposed at the ebb. 

 This species preys on the springtails (Anurida) whose haunts 

 it has invaded. Both its larva and its pupa (Fig. 71, b, c) 



