Lancaster daily intelligencer. [volume] (Lancaster, Pa.) 1864-1928, 1885-06-02
OUR MUSICAL VISITORS.
INTERESTING FACTS AB0UT THE SEV-
ENTEEN-YEAR LOCUSTS.
Their Regular Appearance " On Time'-Ths
HarrnIcssness Of the Locust--The Music
Boxes Carried Only by the Males.
The Victims of the Poultry.


The victims of the Poultry.
From the Baltimore Sun.
In few days the seventeen-ye locusts
will begin to sing their peculiar love s0ng
and make the woods hum with their busy
myriads. Full-fledged locusts have been out
now week or so, but are yet hardly able to
fly in any great numbers. Some of them,
however, have already got into the higher
branches of life, and may be seen already in
the tree tops Occasion has been taken fire.
quently heretofore to impress the fact that
the locust itself is perfectly harmless. but it
is sometimes attended by an enemy known
as the digger wasp, which is fatal to the
locust, and the sting of which will kill a
human being in two hours.
In 1917 the locusts appeared on May % in
1884 about the same time, and in 1851 on May
26. The date of appearance varied little in
1865 and in 1885. Many of the locusts have
died in the ground this spring on account Of
unfavorable circumstances, and their appear
ance has been somewhat delayed by the back
ward spring. The locusts first come i'm the
pupa or soft state, but in a short time become
fully fiedged. About the end of May they
begin to lay their eggs, which are deposited
in the tender twigs of trees. AS soon
as the young attain their growth in
the grub state they fall to the ground,
and make their way two or three
feet underneath the surface, in order
to undergo their change into the pupa
form, after which last transformation
they are found in great numbers over
large districts of country. 1t is claimed
that experiments have demonstrated they
never descend further than six feet into the
earth, and that the eggs must come into con-
tact with the earth before they will advance
towards life. 1t will be II years before the
~f sIn Oh -
sing will reappear from theil hiding places in
the earth. In 1865 thousands of the progeni-
tors of the present visitors came up between
the bricks of the pavements i'm the cities
which had been laid i'm the previous IL years
on new streets. Generally the locusts prefer
the weeds and shady places and not the open
fields. Notwithstanding the common idea
that they are injurious to vegetation 1t ap-
pears from high authority that they are not
so, except from the damage done by the
female in depositng her eggs. Locusts are
favorite food of hogs, squirrels and some of
the larger birds, and are a favorite dish with
the Indians when fried
BY the act OF depositing its eggs the locust
does all the injury of which it is capable.
The excorations thus made injure the young
trees of the nursery, the gooseberry, currant
and other small garden shrubs, but the
apple, pear, peach, plum and cherry trees
only suffer partially. and even this is not be-
lieved to affect the fruit of the succeeding
year. The locust, does not depend for food
upon any living trees above ground, but
lives on the nutrious principles ii collects
from the surface of vegetable substances and
extracts from the earth. As their resurrec-
ton is said to be on the same spots where
they formerly appeared, 1t may be that the
wheat and other fields i'm the country where
they are now found were formerly the site of
a forest or orchard, whence they were
dropped to the earth.
FOUND ONLY IN UNITED STATES.
The locust is emphatically an American
republican insect and found only in the
United States, and that there are two tribes
of these insects, differing from each other
only in the periods of their lives. The
larger family, the northern, living II years,
and the other, the southern, l3 years.
Generally these insects begin to leave the
ground about May 20, and increase to num-
bers till about May q, when the greatest
numbers will appear, and then in less num-
bers till about June 5, when no more will
leave the earth. About June 15 they com
mence depositing their eggs, which continues
until about June 20. The female lays about
400 eggs, excavating holes for that purpose
in the limbs or twigs to which they are at
tached by a singularly constructed instru-
mated as the oyi-positor. About June % the
old locusts disppear altogether. About
July 25 the eggs are ready to hatch, the in
sects come out of the excavations and fall to
the ground in great numbers and are so
small that they are like little NOTES in the
air, and their apparent specific gravity so in
ferior that they are not injured by the
fall.
In the whole range of natural history there
is nothing more strange than the fact that a
little insect, not as large as the smallest ant,
shall pass into the ground and remain there
seventeen years, and then emerge in the
form of a comparatively larger insect and
that most tribes should reappear the same
month, and almost the same day, once in
seventeen years. or thiiteen years. according
to the district to which they belong. Having
made its way into the earth it lives during
the remainder of the warm season in the
vegetable sub-soil, and on the approach of
cold weather forms around itself cocoon, or
cell, by cementing the particles of earth to-
gether, i'm which condition the locusts are
often dug up in gardening and eycavating
without their real character being d isrovered.
The next season it opens one end OF its cell
to gain access to the small roots and moist
earth, but does not leave the cell, and thus it
continues from season to season, each year
enlarging its cell, never changing its locality
from the time it enters the earth until 1t
emerges.
HOW THEY MAKE MUSIC.
The musical organs of the locust, by which
they keep up the peculiar and universal din
from sunrise to sunset, are organs OF sound.
"The musical organs are also very curious
ana difficult TO describe. Directly under the
shoulder of the wing in each side of the chest
there is beautiful membrane somewhat
triangular, convex anu Win ilHe bouy
ridges. This membrane resembles small
shell, and is stretched over a cavity in the
chest, the lower angle connected internally
with strong muscle. On the breast there
are two large scales one on each side, firmly
attached TO the breast above, but free
below. On bending the body backwards
these scales are elevated and expose two
large cavities, also covered with extremely
fine and silk-like membranes. These
cavities are connected with those under
the musical membranes under the wing
shoulders, and probably serve for lungs
When these cavities are filled with air the
musical organs or membranes first described
are made to produce the sound by the large
muscles, the bony ridges of the membranes
being made to act upon each other with such
rapidity that the motion is scarcely percep
tible" Whilst the most harmless and de
fenseless of creatures, this insect has innum
erable enemies. Chickens, turkeys, birds,
squirrels and pigs will scarcely touch any
other food during the locust season, A curl
Gus effect upon all hens eggs laid after feed
ing upon this diet is that their yolks are
nearly white. A remarkable characteristic
of the insect is its solitary life. Although IL
close neighborhood to numerous individuals
OF its class, two are never found in a cell o
in contact This is also their character in thu