Waterbury evening Democrat., 1890-04-05
HOW SOME CREATURES FEED.

1HE clam reeds with Stphon, and the
oyster with it's beard.
The leech has three saws, with which
It does good service in the phebotomy
line.
SPIDERS chew their food with horny
jaws, which are sharp enough to give
quite nip.
The butterfly pumps nectar into itself
through tube, and bees and flies suck
up their food with o long tongue or pro-
boscts.
THE tapeworm has neither mouth nor
stomach, but Just lays along and alb
serbs the already digested food through
it's skin.
SNA1Ls have teeth on their tongues,
hundreds Of them, but, as If these were
| not enough, some have them also in
| their stomach.
THE woodpecker has three-barbed
tongue like a Fijian's spear, with which
it draws out the worm which it has ex-
cited by it's tapping.
The sturgeon is toothless and draws
IN It's food by suction, but the shark
has hundreds of teeth set in rows that
sometimes number ten.
The cuttlef1sh, which among other
strange things, always walks with its
head downward, does not chew its food
at all, but masticates with its gizzard.
ToADs, tortoises, turtles and most
lizards have no teeth. Frogs have
teeth in their upper jaw only. Ant
eaters, sloths and armadillos have no
teeth.
| TIE caterpillar feeds with two saw
edged jaws, working transversely. and
/ uses them to such good advantage that
he eats three or four times his own
weight every day.
| GRAssHoPPERs and locusts are very
we'll provided with the necessary ma
chinery for eating much and often.
They have saw-like jaws, and gizzards,
too, the latter being fitted out with
horny teeth.
The lion and the tiger, and, indeed,
most of the carnivora, do not grind
their food, using their jaws only up and
down, the molars acting like chopping-
knives, or, rather, scissors. Their
mouths, in fact, are veritable hash
mill.
The carps teeth are set back on the
pharynx, SO that it may be literally said
to masticate it's food in it's throat The
fish, the coarsely-swallowed food being
forced up to these throat teeth for COM
plete mastioation.
Docs seize their food with their jaws,
cats with their feet, and SO do monkeys,
some Of them pressing their prehensile
| tails into service. The squirrel uses Its
paws to carry it's food to its mouth; the
elephant it's trunk, the giraffe, ant
eater and toad their tongues.
THE jelly-fish absorbs Its food by
wrapping itself about the object which
it seeks to make its own. Tho star
fish is even more accommodating
Fastening itself to the body it wishes te
feed on, it turns its stomach inside ou
and enwraps its prey with this usefu
organ.
The ray, or skate, for instance, has {
mouth set transversely across It's head
the jaws working with rolling motion
like two hands set back to back. In thu
Jaws are three rows Of fat teeth Sc
like mosaic pavement, and between
these rolling jaws tho fish orlsheI
oysters and other mollusks like so man!
nuts.
HOLSTERS and crabs mastioate thei
food with their horny jaws, but tie,
have also sets of teeth in their stom
achs, where they complete the work
chewing. But there is one pecu11a
kind Of crab called the king or horse
shoe crab which chews its food with 1T
legs. This is an actual fact, the littl
animal grinding it's morsels between it
thighs before it passes them over to 1t