Fort Worth weekly gazette. [volume] (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1890-09-18

present week They come In the rirft and settle
down upon the sidewalks. where they remain to
the next day. until swept off and destroyed
by the people. verify believe that on Monday
and Tuesday mornings of this week five bushels
the Pickwick hotel and in the neighborhood Of
Andrews pavilion, on Thirteenth street. Now,
where do all these ctickets come from2 Some
say that since they appear only in q rainy time
''they are rained down. Others maintain this
they are visitation from the mountains OF the
far West like the Colorado grasshoppers. How
is it? Have we capse for experimenting trouble
of any kind from thems CITIZEN.
Fort Worth. Tex, Sept. 10.
There is nothing specially remarkable
about the crickets themselves, though
there is something of a phenomenon
easily explained, however, in their sud
den and unex peoted appearance on so
large scale. The insect is the common
field cricket known to science as Acheta
campestris. We say common, and yet
we find in our cricket a slight variation
from the regular species just named
though not more so than we find in all
Texas things. 1t is larger and of q
rather lighter color. still all eutomolo-
gists would be apt to class it as Acheta
campestris.
Tue criokets attracting so mucn ate
tion just now did not cram down, -
neither did they come from the mount
aims of the far West. They are veritable
citizens of the regions round about the
points at which they have lately been
picnicing on so grand a scale, aud il is
not at all probable that there Is more
of them with us this year than there has
been, for the same localities, in every
year during the past century.
The field cricket is ruralist; that is,
unlike his cousin (Acheta domestica),
-iasn1 tab H.N
into poetry, he does not live about
human habitations. The open field
clothed in a thick growth of vegetation is
his abiding place, where he burrows into
the ground to the depth of from six or
twelve inches, thus making himself 1:
home. In the early evening twilight the
gentleman of the House may be seen
sitting at the door of his domicil singing
a most monotonous kind of song (the
lady of the house don't siug), and ap-
parently wishing he could go somewhere
to the club or the variety theater, per-
haps-but he can t unless certain natural
conditions happen 10 favor him. He has
a fine pair of wings capable of carrying
him miles at a stretch, but if the weather
chances to be dry they are things more
OF show than utility In a word, the
field cricket cannot fly save in q damp
time. In times of drouth his wings are
rigid and unmanageable, so he has to
stay at home, but so soon as there comes
q rainy spell dampenIng the atm osphere,
his wings leone into CASE as the
tobacco workers say, enabling him to
unfold them and go whittier he visits.
But in justice to the field cricket II may
be stated that he is not much of run
about. He stays pretty close at home
save in one particular short season of the
year, no matter how favorable for his
hight'may be the atmospheric conditions.
But when that short season is Indicated
upon his almanac he invariably goes
unless there is something very serious the
matter to prevent the wings from work
ing.
Like many other insects the field
cricket quits its home at regular season
and flies abroad to pair, and to deposit
its eggs for the next brood. The pairing
season in Northern Texas exte nds from
about the middle of August to about the
middle of September. If the weather
chances to be favorable (not extremely
dry the flight goes on gradually through
the season named, an installment each
night, till the season is over, but should
this be otherwise, all are held back to
walt for moisture, and, as a conse-
quence, the first rain, especially If it
happens to come towards the last of their
flying period, brings the whole business
of them out on lark at the same time.
This condition of affairs fully prevailed
in the present season.
The field cricket is among the nootur-
nal insects attracted by bright light,
hence when the crickets get up into the |
md ole a+rin Iat
though possibly miles away, make a |
bee' line for them. Contact with the |
lamps main large numbers of them and |
thew fall in the streets unable to rise |
again and this is no " we happen to have |
q shower of ,crickets. The lamps most ex- |
posed to view get the largest number of |
them, which explains why more fell at |
Andrews pavilion and the Pickwick ho- |
tel than at other places. The hotel |
lamp, unlike other lamps in that neigh |
borhood, is out in the open street with no |
towering above it, and the pavilion lamp |
hangs far above all surroundings, and |
can be seen greater distance than any |
other lamp in the city.
Had the crIckets came out gradually |
for month, as they would have done
had the weather been in their favor, as
many would have fallen about our cleo
trio lamps perhaps as have just been in
teresting our people, but they would
have been distributed along, only q
few each night, and
therefore would not have attracted any !
particular attention.
There is no trouble to be apprehended.
We have about the same number of field
crickets with US all the time. Our cleo
trio lights may be reducing their num-
bers somewhat; and, by the way, does it
not offer hint worthy of consideration
at the hands of the cotton planter?
Might not exposed electric lights IN the
cotton field do much IN the way of de-
stroying the moths that produce the boil
worm and the cotton worm? Lights in
the cotton field are no new thing, but
ordinary lights are not bright enough to
10 any particular good. The streets of
Fort Worth are, as yet, lighted by gas;
40 one has seen a field cricket monkeying
about any OF the street gas Tampa.
Alfalfa Seed Wanted.
I noticed in Sundav's GAzETTR a conmrrica |