THE MONSTERS OF OL'R IJACK YARDS 



615 



up their breathing pores and asphyxiate 

 them. 



The one in the picture is an old speci- 

 men, preparing to go into winter quar- 

 ters under the leaves and wait for the 

 tender squash and pumpkin vines to ap- 

 pear above the ground. 



It is surprising how quickly they find 

 these juicy shoots, which they pierce 

 with their sucking beaks and upon which 

 they lay the eggs which in a few days 

 hatch out into a brood of small but vo- 

 racious squash-bugs. 



It is ditihcult to realize that the species 

 to which this creature belongs is only 

 one of 5.000 distinct species known in 

 North America, or to fully comprehend 

 the force of a remark made by David 

 Sharp, the English naturalist, that "if 

 anything were to exterminate the ene- 

 mies of the true bugs, we ourselves 

 should probably be starved in the course 

 of a few months." 



In other words, it represents an or- 

 der of sucking insects of many strange 

 shapes which, although directly connected 

 with the welfare of the human race, has 

 been, until recently, the most neglected 

 of all the great orders of insects. 



To this order belong the chinch-bugs, 

 the cause of an estimated loss to grain- 

 growers of 20 million dollars a year ; the 

 great Phylloxera, which destroyed the 

 vines on 3 million acres of French vine- 

 yards, and the San Jose scale, which has 

 spread during the past ten years through. 

 every State and Territory in the United 

 States and become a menace to the fruit- 

 growing industry. 



AX ORr.-WE.WIXG SPIDER (P.\GE 6l6) 



This creature has eight four-jointed 

 legs of varying lengths, covered with 

 large bristles which are hollow and sen- 

 sitive. Hidden behind these legs is the 

 head, with eight eyes, strong jaws, poi- 

 son fangs, and a pair of palpi which 

 look like extremely short legs and seem 

 to serve as hands. The hairy body is 

 filled with thousands of eggs and con- 

 tains also a marvelous reservoir of liquid 

 rope opening into spinnerets on the under 

 side of the body. 



Before you are up on a summer's 

 morning, this wonderful creature will 



ha\c manufactured what would be 

 e(iui\alent to- two miles of elastic and 

 sticky rope if she were as large as a six- 

 foot man. With the skill of an experi- 

 enced hsh-net maker, she will in a few 

 hours construct a net as large as a cart- 

 wheel, with tough, dry, radiating spokes, 

 between which are looped sticky, elastic 

 threads, which no little tlying creature 

 can strike against without running the 

 risk of sticking fast. 



A VAC.Ar.o.XD SPIDER {Pardosa milz-ina), 

 PAGE 617 



This is a vagabond of the spider world, 

 building no nest or web, content to use 

 her marvelous silk in the construction 

 only of a sac in which to lay her eggs. 

 This sac she carries about with her until 

 the eggs have hatched and the spiderlings 

 are strong enough to take care of them- 

 selves, and then she rips open the sac 

 along a distinct seam on the edge and 

 turns her babies loose to shift for them- 

 selves. 



These voracious little cannibals have, 

 however, already learned to forage, as 

 the struggle for existence in many spe- 

 cies of spiders begins in the egg sac, and 

 it is only the strongest who emerge. In 

 other words, they eat each other up. 



They do not grow to be more than 

 half an inch in length, but they are 

 among the most active of all sj^iders, 

 and in the United States alone there are 

 r.early a score of species of these little 

 soldiers of fortune living nowhere and 

 roaming the damp fields in search of 

 prey. 



A JUMPIXG SPIDER (Pliidippiis oiidax), 



PAGE 618 



We are so accustomed to beasts with 

 two eyes that it is hard to realize that all 

 around us. though hard to see. are little 

 monsters with luany eyes of various 

 sizes. 



This one has eight eyes, four of which 

 are invisible from the front. The eyes 

 are diurnal, enabling the creature to hunt 

 only by day. Its eight stout legs fit it 

 for jumjMug forward or sideways with 

 great ease. In comparison with its size, 

 its jumping ])owers are incredible. If it 

 were the size of a tiger, it would be a 



