CHAPTER XX 



SPITTLE BUG SPITTLE 



I 



"^HERE are few country people who have not at one time 

 or another during the summer months, seen curious, foamy 

 masses clinging to the stems of grass or leaves, and created 

 by the spittle bugs. 1 Yet how few have ever taken the 

 trouble to look into these odd creations of the insect world, and how 

 much of interest they have missed through their lack of curiosity. 

 Hidden beneath that foamy covering of tiny bubbles, lies an in- 

 sect, insignificant to be sure, but as interesting in its daily life as 

 the "Big Bugs" with which we are all familiar. Often these spittle 

 masses occur by hundreds in our fields, but are overlooked because 

 the insect knows enough to build its habitation where white clover 

 blooms. In shape and color the foamy masses match the clover 

 so perfectly that a casual observer does not notice the difference. 



The spittle bug is, of course, primarily hatched from a tiny egg 

 which is probably placed by the parent some\vhere about the base 

 of a stem of grass. A single egg is usually deposited upon each 

 stem, although at times one will find exceptions to this rule. Such 

 cases are proved by the occasional presence of several insects in a 

 single mass of spittle. However, little or nothing is really known 

 concerning the egg stage of the spittle bug, the above statements 

 being simply the writer's own conclusions, drawn after considerable 

 study of these creatures. 



Our real intimacy with the spittle bug commences when, having 

 left its egg-shell prison, it comes forth into the world in the form 

 1 Cercopidae. 



