i 



32 CALIFORNIA STATE COMMISSION OF HORTICULTURE. 



upon the tree where they are at rest. These insects are most numerous 

 in the tropics, where they sometimes attain a length of eight or ten 

 inches. All are vegetable feeders, and would become injurious were 

 they introduced and acclimated, but, being tropical, there is little 

 danger from this source. 



Some members of the family are found in the Eastern states, through 

 the Mississippi Valley and in the South, but none have ever been 

 reported from California. 



Section SALTATORIA. 



Family Aerididse (The Locusts). This is a family in which we are 

 especially interested, as it includes the most destructive foes of the 

 farmers of the West. The members of this family are distinguished 

 from others of the order in having the antennae composed of from six 

 to twenty-four joints shorter than the body. It is from this fact that 

 they are sometimes called the short-horned grasshoppers. 



The females lay their eggs, usually underground, but sometimes in 

 other locations, in an oval, bean-like mass. The number of eggs in 

 each mass varies from twenty or thirty to double that number. The 

 holes for the reception of the eggs are made by means of two pairs of 

 horny valves at the tip of the abdomen of the female. These open and 

 shut rapidly and are well adapted to execute this function. The female, 

 by pressing the tip of her abdomen forcibly against the soil, rapidly 

 opens and shuts these hard-pointed valves and soon pushes them into 

 the ground, thus drilling a hole. In a short time the entire and greatly 

 extended abdomen is inserted in the little curved and more or less 

 oblique cavity. The legs are hoisted above the back during the opera- 

 tion of drilling the hole, which requires more or less time, depending 

 entirely upon the character of the soil. As soon as the hole is finished, 

 it is filled with frothy and mucous material. 



Professor Riley describes the method of egg-laying as follows: " By 

 repeatedly extracting and studying specimens in every stage of ovipo- 

 sition, we have been able to ascertain the exact method by which the 

 egg mass is formed. If we could manage to watch a female from the 

 time the bottom of her hole is moistened by the sebific fluid, we should 

 see the valves all brought together, when an egg would pass down the 

 oviduct along the ventral side, and, guided by a little finger-like style, 

 pass in between the horny valves, and issue at their tips amid the 

 mucous fluid already spoken of. Then follows a period of convulsions, 

 during which more mucous material is elaborated, until the whole end 

 of the body is bathed in it, when another egg passes down and is 

 placed in position. These alternate processes continue until the full 

 complement of eggs are in place, the number ranging from twenty to 

 thirty-five, but averaging about twenty-eight. The mucous matter 



