Natural Science News. 



VOL. I 



ALBION, N. Y., AUGUST 10, 1895. 



No. 28 



Natural Science News. 



A Weekly Journal Devoted to 

 Natural History. 



FRANK H. LATTIN, Editor and Publisher, 

 ALBION, N. Y. 



Correspondence and Items of interest to the 

 student of any of the various branches of the 

 Natural Sciences solicited from all. 



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 The Cicada. 



During this month (August) the 

 Seventeen-year locust ( Cicada scp- 

 tendecini)oi Linnaeus, has disappear- 

 ed, and only a few Harvest flies, 

 as the two other species we have 

 are called, raise their shrill cry 

 during the dog-days. But as cer- 

 tain years are marked by the ap- 

 pearance of vast swarms in the 

 Middle States, we cannot do bet- 

 ter than to give a brief summary 

 of its history, which we condense 

 in part from Dr. Harris's work. 



The Seventeen-year locust ranges 

 from South-eastern and Western 

 Massachusetts to Louisiana. Of 

 its distribution west of the Missis- 

 sippi Valley, we have no accurate 

 knowledge. In Southern Massa- 

 chusetts, they appear in oak for- 

 ests about the middle of June. 

 After pairing, the -female, by 

 means of her powerful ovipositor, 

 bores a hole obliquely to the pith, 

 and lays therein from ten to twen- 

 ty slender white eggs, which are 

 arranged in pairs, somewhat like 

 the grains on an ear of wheat, and 

 implanted in the limb. She thus 

 oviposits several times in a twig, 

 and passes from one to another, 

 until she has laid four or five hun- 

 dred eggs. After this she soon 

 dies. The eggs hatch in about 

 two weeks, though some observers 

 state that they do not hatch for 

 from forty to over fifty days after 

 being laid. The active grubs are 

 provided with three pairs of legs. 

 After leaving the egg they fall to 



the ground, burrow into it; and 

 seek the roots of plants whose 

 juices they suck by means of their 

 long beaks. They sometimes at- 

 tack the roots of fruit trees, such 

 as the pear and apple. They live 

 nearly seventeen years in the lar- 

 va state, and then in the spring 

 change to the pupa, which chiefly 

 differs from the larva by having 

 rudimentary wings. The damage 

 done by the larvae and pupae, then, 

 consists in their sucking the sap 

 from the roots of forest, and occas- 

 ionally fruit trees. 



Regarding its appearance, Mr. L. 

 B. Case writes us (June 15) from 

 Richmond, Indiana: "Just now 

 we are having a tremendous quan- 

 tity of locusts in our forests and 

 adjoining fields, and people are 

 greatly alarmed about them; some 

 say they are Egyptian locusts, etc. 

 This morning they made a noise, 

 in the woods, about half a mile 

 east of us, very much like the con- 

 tinuous sound of frogs in the early 

 spring, or just before a storm at 

 evening. It lasted from early in 

 the morning until evening." Mr. 

 V. T. Chambers writes us that it 

 is abounding in the vicinity of 

 Covington, Kentucky, "in com- 

 mon with a large portion of the 

 Western country." He points out 

 some variations in color from 

 those described by Dr. Fitch, from 

 New York, and states that those 

 occurring in Kentucky are smaller 

 than those of which the measure- 

 ments are given by Dr. Fitch, and 

 states ihat these differences indi- 

 cate that the groups, appearing in 

 different parts of the country at in- 

 tervals of seventeen! years, are of 

 different varieties. " A careful com - 

 parison of large numbers collected 

 from different broods, in different 

 localities and different years, would 

 alone give the facts to decide this 

 interesting point. Mr. Riley has 

 shown that in the* Southern States 

 a variety appears ever}' thirteen 

 years. 



Regarding the question raised 

 by Mr. Chambers, whether the 

 sting of this insect is poisonous, 

 and which he is inclined to believe 

 to be in part true, we might say 

 that naturalists generally believe 

 it to be harmless. No Hemiptera 

 are known to be poisonous, that is, 

 to have a poison-gland connected 

 with the sting, like that of the bee, 

 and careful dissections by the emi- 

 nent French naturalist, Lacaze- 

 Duthiers, of three European spe- 



cies of Cicada, have not revealed 

 any poison apparatus at the base 

 of the sting. Another proof that 

 it does not pour poison into the 

 wound made by the ovipositor is, 

 that the twig thus pierced and 

 wounded does not swell, as in the 

 case of plants wounded by Gall 

 flies, which, perhaps, secrete an 

 irritating poison, giving rise to 

 tumors of various shapes. Many 

 insects sting without poisoning the 

 wound; the bite of the mosquito, 

 black fly, flea, the bed-bug and 

 other hemipterous insects, are sim- 

 ply punctured wounds, the saliva 

 introduced being slightly irritant, 

 and to a perfectly healthy consti- 

 tution they are not poisonous, 

 though they may grievously afflict 

 some persons, causing the adjacent 

 parts to swell, and in some weak 

 constitutions induce severe sick- 

 ness. Regarding this point, Mr. 

 Chambers writes: 



"I have heard— not through the 

 papers — within a few days past of 

 a child, within some twenty miles 

 of this place, dying from the sting 

 of a Cicada, but have not had an 

 opportunity to inquire into the 

 truth of the story, but the follow- 

 ing you may rely on. A negro 

 woman in the employment of A. 

 V. Winston, Esq., at Burlington, 

 Boone County, Ky. , fifteen miles 

 distant from here, went barefooted 

 into his garden a few days since, 

 and while there was stung or bit- 

 ten in the foot by a Cicada. The 

 foot immediately swelled to huge 

 proportions, but by various appli- 

 cations the inflammation was al- 

 layed, and the woman recovered. 

 Mr. Winston, who relates this, 

 stands as high for intelligence and 

 veracity as any one in this vicinity. 

 I thought, on first hearing the 

 story, that probably the sting was 

 by some other insect, but Mr. 

 Winston says that he saw the Ci- 

 cada. But perhaps this proves that 

 the sting is not fatal; that depends 

 on the subject. Some persons 

 suffer terribly from the bite of a 

 mosquito, while others scarcely 

 feel them. The cuticle of a ne- 

 gro's foot is nearly impenetrable, 

 and perhaps the sting would have 

 been more dangerous in a more 

 tender part." 



It is not improbable that the 

 sting was made by a wasp (Stizits') 

 which preys on the Cicada. Dr. 

 Le Baron and Mr. Riley believe 

 the wound to be made by the beak, 



