The Crickets 



descriptive names are applied to it in many foreign tongues. The 

 common field crickets (Gryllus neglectus, for example,) are often 

 very musical at night. Scudder says that sometimes the notes 

 are produced as slowly as two per second, but that they may be 

 twice as rapid. The note is a shrill one, and is said to be 

 pitched at e natural, two octaves above middle c. It is recorded 

 as follows : 



cirri cirri crrri crrrl crrrt 



Fig. 232. Song of the field cricket. (After Scudder.) 



Perhaps the commonest night song, however, is that of the 

 snowy tree cricket (CEcanthus ntveus et al). The notes of our 

 three or four species of snowy tree crickets vary much in intensity. 

 There is a distinct relation between the temperature and the 

 number of notes per minute. Professor Dolbear has reduced this 

 to a mathematical formula. He says: 



Let T = temperature in degrees Fahrenheit; N = number of 

 chirps per minute. Then T = 5O + N - 4 . This would give 100 

 chirps for 65 degrees Fahrenheit. 



This formula has been tested in Massachusetts by Dr. Robert 

 Edes and Mr. Walter Faxon, who find that from actual records 

 the temperature is about 63 degrees to 100 chirps, with an error of 

 variation of one degree or less in four-fifths of the cases. The 

 day song is annotated by Mr. Scudder as follows, and he states 

 that it is a nearly uniform, equally-sustained trill lasting from two or 

 three seconds to a minute or two. The insect, however, "often 

 begins its note at a different pitch from the normal one fourth/ 

 above middle c as if it required a little practice to attain it." 



thrrr ------ ...--...------_-__.__ 



m00000000\000000000 0-0-0-0-0-0-0 



thrrr 



Fig. 233. Day song of a snowy tree cricket. (After Scudder.) 



The song of CEcanthus ntveus is by far the most famil- 

 iar one. Riley gave the best description of it when he said 

 that it "is intermittent, resembling a shrill 're-teat, re-teat, 



343 



