76 
PLANTS AND INSECTS 
The food of beetles and their young is as varied as their habits. 
Many of them feed on vegetable matter, both living and dead; other 
species live on animal food, which they capture alive; while still others 
show a fondness for decaying matter. Thus, in their* habits of feeding 
some are very helpful to man; but, taken as a whole, they alre con¬ 
sidered as being economically injurious. 
They have many enemies, as birds, reptiles, rodents, frogs, and 
toads. These prey upon the beetle in both the adult and the larval 
stage. 
In their life cycle, beetles undergo a complete metamorphosis, one 
quite similar to that in the development of butterflies and moths. The 
eggs are laid in such situations as will afford food for the young 
larvae, or grubs, as they are generally called, when they are hatched. 
The pupae of some species are enclosed in cocoons, or cases; others 
pass this stage in burrows in wood, and still others beneath the surface 
of the ground. There are various other modes of preparation for the 
pupal stage, which usually lasts only a few weeks or months, but in 
some cases years. 
HOME LIFE IN AN ANT COLONY 
NTS are close relatives of wasps and bees. Not only is their 
^ structure similar, but also their instincts and modes of govern¬ 
ing their societies. Bees have two forms of the female sex—the well 
developed ones, or queens, and the imperfect ones, or workers. In 
the ant colony there are (1) the Well developed females, which produce 
the eggs and thereby propagate the species; (2) the smaller imperfect 
females, or workers, some of which gather food, while others nurse the 
young; (3) the larger imperfect females, which act as soldiers 1 to pro¬ 
tect the ranks of foraging workers. 
Usually the males and the perfect females have wings, and the 
workers are wingless; but exceptions to this are not uncommon. Queen 
ants are more peaceable than queen bees, and more than one queen 
ant may, without quarrels, live in a single colony. 
When the winged males and females, emerging from their pupas- 
cases, make their appearance in the ant colony, they are guarded by the 
workers until a suitable time for flight. Finally, on the warm days 
of summer and autumn they are permitted to go into the air where 
