Grasshopper Glacier of Montana and Its 



Relation to Long-distance Flights of 



Grasshoppers 



By Ashley B. Gurney 



Bureau of Entomology and Plant Quarantine 

 U. S. Department of Agriculture 



[With 8 plates] 



Insects probably occur in situations more diverse than those oc- 

 cupied by any other living creatures. Some of these situations, such 

 as the water of tree holes and of hotsprings, the oil of petroleum pools, 

 and the surface of woodland snow in midwinter, are natural habi- 

 tats where it is perfectly normal to find particular species of insects 

 at one or more periods of their seasonal development. Other sub- 

 stances, including the resin of coniferous trees, may trap insects 

 that accidently become caught in the course of their normal move- 

 ments. A somewhat different situation is represented by snow, frozen 

 and solidified into ice, which under very special circumstances con- 

 tains the bodies of insects that apparently did not go to the vicinity 

 by their own choice but that nevertheless were preserved under en- 

 tirely natural circumstances. Thus, in several places at high eleva- 

 tions large ice masses or glaciers contain grasshopper remains of 

 uncertain age solidly frozen at considerable depths. The best known 

 of these frozen accumulations of grasshoppers is in Grasshopper 

 Glacier, located in Montana near the northeastern corner of Yellow- 

 stone National Park. 



Grasshopper Glacier has been known for more than 55 years, and 

 to entomologists (who are always looking for insects in strange 

 places) and nonscientists alike the name of this glacier has aroused 

 considerable interest. Unfortunately, few trained observers have 

 visited Grasshopper Glacier, and there has been relatively little 

 factual information about either the age of the glacier itself or 

 the sources of the frozen insect remains. Recent observations have 

 attracted further attention to the glacier and have contributed some 

 significant facts on the grasshoppers which, at irregular intervals, 

 fall upon the upper surface of the ice. For these reasons, it is 

 timely to assemble what is known about Grasshopper Glacier. One 



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