TEXAS NATURE 0B5ERVATI01TS AND REMINISCENCES. 37 



■ton. This was January 18, 1910, 

 and six days later, on examining 

 the ticks two of them had hatched 

 myriads of pinhead size eggs of 

 oval or rounded shape and red- 

 dish brown color and of uniform 

 size. These er-"- were conglomer- 

 ated together like a bunch of 

 grapes and hundreds of them were 

 hatched by a single tick in a few 

 liours and the photo-reproduction 

 of this tick seen herein, with 

 a portion of the myriads of tick 

 eggs it had deposited a short time 

 l)efore, gives us an idea how im- 



developing, and on February 20, 

 a few of the latter specimens were 

 again mounted on a slide glass, 

 and a microscopic photo plate 

 prepared. This view shows how 

 the eggs progressed developing in 

 the meantime, and how the cellu- 

 lar and other elements of the egg 

 contents developed into a separate 

 oval-shaped body — the future cat- 

 tle tick — these embryonic bodies, 

 of course, still being under de- 

 velopment, until the advancing 

 warmer weather was to eventually 

 develop all of the embryos into 



Texas Cattle Tick, Magnified Several Times 

 AND Eggs It Laid in Conpinement. 



mensely these ticks breed. The 

 tick, with its eggs on this view, is 

 magnified about five times, show- 

 ing the tick on its dorsal side, 

 with the surrounding glistening 

 eggs. 



Being now more interested to 

 note the further development of 

 ■such eggs, numbers of them were 

 mounted in an artificial blood 

 preparation (bovinine) and gly- 

 cerine and, though observed dur- 

 ing .cold weather we had at the 

 time, the eggs slowly progressed 



the mature insect. 



These developing eggs show 

 how the outer egg-shell — its cal- 

 careous environments — -has separ- 

 ated from, the inside delicate egg 

 membranes, inside of which the 

 developing tick embryo is snugly 

 imbedded. 



When examined several days 

 after the first crop of eggs 

 is laid, the original fresh egg shell 

 assumes a darker color, nearly 

 black, from accumulated calcare- 

 ous and other matter, but later 



