226 Some data for the Natural History of Orange Co. N. Y, 



distance from the ground, and then shed their coats, turn 

 black, and fly about in two or three hours. 



There was a difference of several days in the leaving of 

 their holes, between such as bred in warm soils and situations, 

 and such as were in soils and situations that were damp and 

 cold. 



On the 1 1th June, (1 809,) near twelve o'clock, was the first 

 that I heard the locusts sing that year — so that they must 

 have been out of their earth-suit six days. 



On the 1st day of June, 1 792, the locusts were at their great- 

 est height of singing for that year, but in 1809 it must have 

 been nearly the middle of June, which was owing to the cold- 

 ness and backwardness of the season. The two first locust 

 years that I saw them, they would collect on trees, bushes, 

 &c. and their songs might be said to be heard every where : 

 but in the year 1809 they seemed to collect mostly in warm 

 situations. They flew from my orchard between ninety and 

 one hundred rods, to my timber land, by thousands ; and at 

 that distance I have often amused myself by listening to their 

 united songs. It is only the male that sings, and he makes 

 the sound or song with a small white spot under each wing. 

 It appears to be a note or love call to the females, for they 

 commonly flew in greater numbers to the spot where the loud- 

 est songs were heard. 



The female, after union with the male, deposits her eggs, 

 by means of a probe or sort of sting, in the tender twigs and 

 branches of bushes and trees, with a great deal of application 

 and labor. 



It was on the 1 2th of July, 1 809, that I heard the last sing- 

 ing of the locust, so that the males live probably only about 

 forty days after they begin to sing ; and in about fifty days or 

 less the whole of them die. 



After the females had deposited their eggs- in the summer 

 of 1 809, my curiosity was so excited that I constantly exam- 

 ined the eggs, deposited by thousands in the small limbs of 

 bushes and trees ; and I found that they were all hatched (in 

 Other words, were all empty) in the latter part of August. 



In digging or ploughing land that has young locusts in it, 

 they are found two or three years before the locust year. 

 They are then small, and each one occupies its own appro- 

 priate hole or cell, which is a little wider than the body of the 

 insect, and approaches within two or three inches of the sur- 

 face of the earth. In the succeeding years, each one, as it 



