REARING AND COLLECTING ANIMALS 475 



fitted into a light wooden or cane handle about three and a 

 half feet long. 



The killing-bottle (fig. 241) is prepared by putting a few 

 small lumps (about a teaspoonful) of cyanide of potassium 

 into the bottom of a wide-mouthed bottle holding about four 

 ounces, and covering this cyanide with wet plaster of Paris. 

 When the plaster sets it will hold the cyanide in place, and 

 allow the fumes given off by its gradual volatilization to fill 

 the bottle. Insects dropped into it will be killed in from 

 two or three to ten minutes. Keep a little tissue paper in 

 the bottle to soak up moisture and to prevent the specimens 

 from rubbing. Also keep the bottle well corked. Label 

 it "Poison," and do not breathe the fumes (hydrocyanic gas). 

 Insects may be left in it over night without injury to them. 



Butterflies or dragon-flies too large to drop into the kill- 

 ing-bottle may be killed by dropping a little chloroform or 

 benzine on a piece of cotton, to be placed in a tight box with 

 them. Larvae (caterpillars, grubs, etc.) and pupae (chrysa- 

 lids) should be dropped into the vials of alcohol. 



In collecting, visit flowers, sweep the net back and forth 

 over the small flowers and grasses of meadows and pastures, 

 look under stones, break up old logs and stumps, poke about 

 decaying matter, jar and shake small trees and shrubs, and 

 .visit ponds and streams. Many insects can be collected in 

 summer at night about electric lights, or a lamp by an open 

 window. 



When the insects are brought home or to the schoolroom 

 they must be "pinned up." Buy insect-pins, long, slender, 

 small-headed, sharp-pointed pins, of a dealer in naturalists' 

 supplies (see p. 464). These pins cost ten cents a hundred. 

 Order Klaeger pins. No. 3, or Carlsbaeder pins. No. 5. 

 These are the most useful sizes. For larger pins order Klae- 

 ger No. 5 (Carlsbaeder No. 8); for smaller order Klaeger 

 No. I (Carlsbaeder No. 2). Pin each insect straight down 

 through the thorax (fig. 242) (except beetles, which pin through 

 the right wing-cover near the middle of the body) . On each 

 pin below the insect place a small label with date and locality 

 of capture. Insects too small to be pinned may be gummed 



