158 Cockroaches, Locusts, Grasshoppers, and Crickets 



To sin;;, the males lift their wing-covers at an angle of about 45° over the 

 back, and strongly rub together the bases. Their chirping is made either 

 in the daytime or night, and is a love call or song for their mates. We have 

 several common crickets in dwellings, one, Gryllus domesticus (Fig. 223) 

 being the Euro])ean house-cricket, the "cricket on the 

 hearth,'' which is becoming at home here, being espe- 

 cially met with in Canada. It is pale brown and less 

 than an inch long. Gryllus luiluosits and G. assimilis 

 are two native crickets which are common in houses; 

 they are black with brownish-black wing-covers, larger 

 and more robust than domeslkus, and with the folded 

 wings projecting backward beyond the wing-covers like 

 pointed tails. These house-crickets are most active 

 at night, and seem to have a taste for almost any 

 fot)d-product in the house. They will eat each other 

 when other food is scarce. If they become so nu- 

 merous in the house that they need to be got rid of, 

 advantage may be taken of their liking for sweet 

 liquids by exposing smooth-walled vessels half filled 

 Fig 223— Thc'Euro- ^^'^'^ ^^^^ liquids, into which the crickets will fall and 

 pean "house -cricket, drown in their attempts to get at the food. The most 



Gryllus domeslkus, abundant and wide-spread outdoors cricket is Grvlhis 

 female. {.'Vfter Lug- ' /- 1 ' 



ger; natural size in- abhrcviaiiis (Fig. 224), the short-winged field-cricket. 



dicated by line.) -pj^g wings are sometimes wanting, but more often pres- 



ent and shorter than the wing-covers, which in the females are themselves 

 unusually short, reaching but half-way to the end of the abdomen. The 

 slender ovipositor is as long as the 

 body, and the hind femora are very 

 thick and have a red spot at the 

 base on either side. The life-history 

 of this common insect is not yet fully 

 known, some writers stating that the 

 eggs laid in autumn do n()t hatch until 

 the following spring, the insect thus 

 passing the winter in the egg stage, Fig 224.— The short-winged cricket, Gryllus 

 while others have taken half-grown abbrcviulus. (Natural size.) 



young from beneath logs in late autumn and in midwinter. The field- 

 cricket is "nocturnal, omnivorous, and a cannibal. Avoiding the light 

 of day," says Blatchlcy, "he ventures forth as soon as darkness has fallen, 

 in search of food, and all appears to be fish which comes to his net. Of 

 fruit, vegetables, grass, and carrion he seems equally fond, and does not 



