154 WASP STUDIES AFIELD 



where they had been placed in the jar; even the one bearing 

 the egg had wandered away. All responded actively to stim- 

 ulation. By 7 o'clock of the second morning, the egg had 

 hatched, even though its cricket host was still persistently 

 active. The larva was a delicate little yellow creature, not 

 very fat. In spite of its small size, it was a little gourmand, 

 and, by the second day of its life, it had devoured almost all 

 of the first cricket. The other two crickets were still alive 

 and we wanted to keep them to test their longevity, so we 

 substituted for them another and larger specimen of the 

 same species. We crushed its head before placing it with 

 the larva, lest by its activity it might do some injury to the 

 latter. By 9 o'clock that evening, the larva had devoured 

 the contents of this one also, leaving only a thin, dry shell. 

 The infant grew well and seemed to thrive on this, so that 

 night we gave it another newly-killed cricket of the same 

 kind. This one was larger than the others almost full-grown 

 so, lest the integument would be too tough, a few incisions 

 were made in the abdominal wall before serving it. The 

 larva was placed thereon and it fell to at once, greedily de- 

 vouring the juices. By this time the smaller cricket, which 

 had constituted the original prey, had grown quite feeble, 

 but the larger one was still active. 



With the introduction of the last cricket, the larva had 

 had three, the number originally provided for it by its 

 mother; but two of these were much larger than those 

 which she had supplied. We did not presume to interfere 

 further with the mother's provision by offering it more 

 food, once it had consumed this, yet it failed to pupate and 

 eventually died, after three days more, probably because its 

 nursery was not properly equipped or regulated. The other 

 two crickets which had been stung- and buried lived four 

 days. 



Almost a month later, August 22, we were scouring a 



