ACROBAT COWS ARE DISCOVERED 259 



dred eggs. Then she stays on this sack as a roof and lays 

 eggs until she dies. This scale does a lot of harm to trees. 



KENNETH. When the ants stroke the mother and older 

 children, balls of honey-dew appear. "Within ten minutes 

 I saw a cow give up four balls of milk to a brunette 

 Acrobat while a blonde one waited for a fifth. 



FLORENCE. One writer says he saw a plant louse give 

 up forty-eight drops of honey in twenty-four hours. 



KENNETH. But don't think an Acrobat can always 

 get five drops in ten minutes, as I have just mentioned. 

 Once I saw it take five hours to get one tiny drop, and 

 that was the first milking I watched. I had a notion to 

 help. 



ALBERT. The Carpenters know better than to bother 

 the Acrobat herds and the Acrobats know better than to 

 bother the Carpenter herds. Sure death is the penalty in 

 either case. 



FLORENCE. The Carpenters go out alone and search 

 all over shrubs and trees for cows. It looks to me as if 

 they are better hunters than the Acrobats. They have 

 plant lice herds on three plants while the Acrobats have 

 scale herds on only one. 



CECIL. But I think that either could defend a herd 

 against the other after getting possession. 



ALBERT. The Acrobats herd their cows so carefully in 

 order to keep ladybugs and other insects away. The Car- 

 penters do the same. A ladybug was eating a young plant 

 louse one day, but a Carpenter soon put an end to the 

 meal. 



CECIL. Today three Carpenters ran into a trail of 

 Acrobats near the acacia where the Acrobat herd is. One 

 Carpenter escaped, but each of the other two soon lost a 

 feeler. Nine Acrobats and two Carpenters was the death 



