580 ANNUAL. REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 192 8 



SONGS OF THE BUSH CRICKETS CYCLOPTILUM, SUBFAMILY 

 INTOGOI'LISTINAE 



Very little appears to have been written concerning the stridulations 

 of the species of Gycloptilum. According to Rehn and Hebard the 

 notes of the species C . squamosum and the more southern race, C. 

 squamosum zehra^ are brief intermittent chirps. 



SONGS OF THE GROUND AND FIELD CRICKETS, SUBFAMILY 



GRYLLINAE 



In the genus Gryllus^ which includes several recognized races of 

 the single native species, Gryllus asshnilis, the typical chirping habit 

 appears to be the rule. However, I have reported a phj^siological 

 race with a habit of continuous trilling, which I found in northern 

 Georgia. I have heard one individual with the same trilling habit 

 in the Washington, D. C, populations. An introduced species of 

 Gryllus^ the European house cricket, G. domesticus^ chirps casually 

 and intermittently, but with less vim than our own native species. 



In the genus Nemohius, comprising many of our smallest ground 

 crickets which have become adapted to a wide range of habitats, 

 from dry fields and Avoods to cold sphagnum bogs, several methods 

 of stridulation prevail. A continuous stridulation is the behavior of 

 N. falustris and N . caroUnus. The habit of intermittent stridulation 

 is characteristic of N. omhitiosus and N. fasciatus. Physiological 

 races of the latter appear to have specialized in somewhat different 

 methods of stridulation, for I have found colonies in different locali- 

 ties and habitats trilling distinctive notes. One mode of stridulation 

 is a very high-jjitched, prolonged trill, ti-ti-ti-ti-ti-ti. The succession 

 of the wing strokes appears to be very slow, so that each syllable ti 

 represents a single draw of the scraper over the file vein. Another 

 mode of stridulation is a brief, intermittent chirp or trill, tiiii — tiiii — 

 tiiii — tiiii, which appears to be a more or less rhythmic sectioning 

 of a very rapid trilling moA'ement of the wings. 



In the genera HygronemoMus, Anurogryllus^ Miogryllu-s and 

 Gryllodes every variation prevails, from the continuous quavering 

 trill to the distinctly intermittent chirp. The species Hygroneino- 

 hius alleni and Anurogryllus muticus are content with the unbroken, 

 high-speed trill. The cricket, Gryllodes sigillatus, introduced from 

 the Tropics and occurring commonly in greenhouses everywhere, and 

 one of the most energetic of crickets, may be said to trill slowly or 

 chirp hurriedly, as one cares to see it. The note is squeaky and 

 continuous, like the shrill squeak of a rusty hinge, produced in a long 

 fast series at a rate of 400 to 500 per minute, or about as fast as one 

 can possibly count. I am inclined to believe that these individual 

 chirps are single strokes of the wing and that a little more speed, 

 up to 800 or 1,000 strokes per minute, would run them into the typical 



