28 ANIMAL BIOLOGY 



Grasshoppers, too, are admirably provided with organs 

 of locomotion. In fact, they derive tho>r name from the ex- 

 traordinary feats of jumping, which they accomplish largely 

 by their long and muscular hind legs. If a boy could jump 

 twenty times the length of his legs, that is, a distance of 50 

 feet, he would make an athletic record corresponding to that 

 of the common red-legged locust. For the hind legs of an 

 ordinary specimen of this insect are about 2 inches long, 

 and they frequently leap 4 feet. The wings are also of great 

 assistance in enabling the animal to secure its food or to 

 escape its enemies. Flight is accomplished by the help of 

 the hind pair only, and when these are not in use, they are 

 folded like a fan beneath the outer pair. 



22. Life history of the grasshopper. The male grass- 

 hopper may be easily distinguished by the rounded tip of 

 the abdomen; the abdomen of the female, on the other 

 hand, has at its posterior extremity four movable parts which 

 constitute the egg-laying organ or ovi- 

 positor (Fig. 19). The eggs are pro- 

 duced within the body of the female 

 insect. Before these eggs can develop, 

 however, each must be fertilized by 

 a sperm-cell produced by the male 

 grasshopper, just as an egg-cell of a 

 plant must be fertilized by the sperm- 

 nucleus of a pollen grain (P. B., 91). 

 After the process of fertilization has 

 FIG. 19. Grasshopper taken place, the female grasshopper 



laying eggs. (Riley, U. ^ . ' ' 



S.Dept. of Agriculture.) (usually in the fall of the year) bur- 

 rows a hole in the ground by alter- 

 nately bringing together, pushing into the earth, and then 

 spreading apart, the four projections that make up the 



