50 PSYCHE [June 



Food. 



It is certain that these earwigs are at least partly carnivorous. Any dead 

 insect not protected by too tough a covering will serve them as food. In captivity 

 they also eat cooked fish, chicken, and mutton, and both raw and cooked beef. 

 They probably would also eat raw fish, fowl, or flesh of any kind if given them. 

 The fact of their eating their own cast-off skins has been already noted. Whether 

 or not they eat any vegetable food is a question, despite the common belief that 

 they do. Certainly I have never seen one that did. I caught and dissected three 

 earwigs and found that the alimentary tract of two contained animal matter only — 

 very small insects, etc. In the stomach of the third, it is true, there were a few 

 particles of starch, but this may have been accidentally eaten together with animal 

 matter. Those which I have freshly caught, and those which I have kept in con- 

 finement for some time, would readily eat animal matter, but refused vegetable 

 matter. 



Some Habits Noticed. 



I found that the earwigs were not at all afraid of entering the brackish water 

 in the bay at Cold Spring Harbor, where they were found. Some voluntarily swam 

 about from place to place. Perhaps they more properly floated than swam, for 

 their movements were mainly on the surface of the water, and often their backs 

 were perfectly dry. When frightened, however, they would often crawl to the under 

 side of some floating object and hide themselves under water. 



Earwigs easily dig holes in the sand. Those which I have observed used only 

 their mouth-parts in digging. They never kicked or pushed the earth out with 

 their feet. 



Earwigs do not seem to be nearly as much afraid of the light as are our 

 common centipedes {Lithobius americaiins). They are said to be nocturnal in their 

 habits, and to hide themselves by day " in any dark cranny that they can find," 

 but those which I studied often apparently preferred the light to the darkness, 

 although as a rule they chose the darkness. 



I have observed that whenever the ground was wet an earwig walking over it 

 would so twist its heavy abdomen that the narrow side rather than the flat bottom 

 would come in contact with the ground and thus serve as a runner to support its 

 weight. 



Egg Laying and Care of the Young. 



When about to lay her eggs the female would make a little chamber for herself 

 in the ground about half an inch deep, and one, or one and one-quarter, inches 



