| Crest Ca ae | 
Cricket Sings Security Song 
by LE ROY LINTEREUR 
Reprinted by permission from Wisconsin Conservation Bulletin 
Let anyone who thinks virtue goes its way unrewarded, reflect on the 
cricket. I personally would frown on the killing of one and an anti-cricket 
campaign would be unthinkable. Society is quite willing to forgive the 
cricket for any damage, real or imagined that it may do to property, and 
in a sense, has approved this insect. 
And all it has to do for this protection and favored position is chirp. 
As the robin’s song is the sound of spring, the cricket’s call relates to fall 
and this unseen singer is as much a sign of the new season as colored 
leaves and goldenrod. 
As autumn progresses we welcome it the more—as long as the crick- 
ets sing, part of the bright world is still with us and, like the last flower, 
when it is gone and so is the season. 
Our world would be less so were it not for crickets, and in the age 
in which we are moving this is a point we might well think over. A 
singing cricket is not only a sign of summer’s end, but a statement that 
this little corner of the world is in a state of well-being. This creature 
silent may mean many things, but most ominous of all and most relevant 
for man it could be that the insect, like so many others, is a victim of the 
poisons that we are showering onto the earth. And it is beyond argument 
that what is poison to bugs can be poison to humans. 
There was a time not too long ago, when the significance of a wild 
creature was in its use or indirect value to mankind—at the very least, 
they were interesting and made the world beautiful. Or so we chose to 
think, if indeed we thought of them at all. Our technology has blasted 
this innocent view and is swiftly backing us into a corner where we are 
indeed one with every living creature that shares the world with us. A 
poison is still a poison, whether it belches from a smoke stack, is sprayed 
from a plane, or poured into a stream. It hurts humans and wildlife alike, 
and we are all in the same corner. 
All living things have taken on a new significance and whether it 1s a 
butterfly winging over a meadow, a mosquito biting a person, or a 
cricket singing, they speak of a world where a sane balance prevails and, 
even with the bit, safe for man. 
And so, after all these millenia, our crickets sing a new song. It still 
tells of the coming frost and falling leaves, of a welcome coolness, and 
the fading summer. So long as they sing, their song is of a world fit for 
man and cricket alike. For the good of humanity and for every living 
thing on this earth, there is no alternative. 
