274 I The Wonderful Ways of Insects and Spiders 



How to Feed Water Insects: When you collect your specimens, it 

 is wise to take extra insects to serve as food. You can also obtain 

 food by sweeping an insect net through weeds and tall grass. 

 Often the flesh-eating nymphs will eat tiny bits of meat. This 

 should be tied to a string and pulled out again if it has not been 

 eaten by the next day. If you wish to keep both flesh-eating and 

 plant-eating species, you will need more than one aquarium. 



An insect aquarium should be located in a bright spot, but 

 not directly in the sunlight. Keep the inner sides of the glass 

 cleaned with a piece of flannel wrapped about a stick. This will 

 give you good "observation windows" through which to see a 

 caddis worm building, a dragonfly nymph snatching at prey with 

 its long, hinged lip, or the tiny larva of a whirligig creeping 

 stealthily over the bottom as it looks for other larvae to eat. And 

 if you successfully keep them to maturity, you will have the added 

 thrill of observing them transformed from underwater "per- 

 sonalities" to winged creatures of the air. 



Insect Oddities 



THE GALLS WEIRD HOMEMAKERS 



Insects provide many of nature's most remarkable oddities. 

 You have discovered one of them when you observe a curious 

 "bump" or ball on a plant stem or flower, reminding you of a 

 large nut growing on a tree branch or leaf. It may be greenish, 

 brown, pink, or red. If you were to cut open one of these bumps, 

 you would discover an insect larva at its center. This identifies 

 it as a "gall," the home of a growing creature that will develop 

 into a small wasp, fly, or moth. 



The young nature observer is likely to be puzzled by the im- 

 prisoned larva. "How does it get in there? I don't see any opening 

 from the outside." 



How a Gall Insect Develops: Actually, the larva doesn't "get in"; 

 its home grows about it! Let us follow the life cycle of one of the 

 common gall insects a very small wasp responsible for the "oak 

 apple." In early spring we see it deposit its eggs on the leaf of a 

 scarlet oak. When one of these eggs develops into a legless and 



