Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1891-01-08
WINTER INSECTS.

| DOSJon ntIdiu
On a winter day, when the scar land
scape is enlivened by an unclouded sun
let his genial rays tempt the reader to &
stroll in the Pennsylvania woods. He
may be cheered by no bird song; nc
plants, except q few evergreen leaves
may brighten his path; but insect life
will be there to welcome him, says a
writer in the Philadelphia Press
Those merriest of dancers, the gnats,
come from the moist earth at the call of
the sun. Mosquito like, they have
passed their immature lite in the water,
and the cases of the little wrigglers are
ready to burst open and liberate the
winged insects whenever the sun peeps
forth from the clouds. This may occur
On sunny day, even when the temper
ature of the air is far below the freezing
point.
Artic explorers tell US that as far
north as they have gone, away up in the
icy fields of Greenland, even where
there is no vegetation, these gnats, or a
species so closely resembling them that
only naturalists can detect the difference,
are found dancing on wing in the sun
light or clinging to the sides of boats
and sledges.
As we continue our walk through the
winter woods we turn over log and
find crawling about beneath it small,
black beetles, few tough-skinned,
hard-headed grubs, and now and then a
spider. If the sun shines brightly, even
though snow may lie deep on the ground,
wasps will be tempted forth from crew
ices of bark in which they have lain |
dormant with the cold, and after becom-
ing thoroughly warmed, they will take |
wing thruogh the woods.
A butterfly known as the Mourning
Cloak, richly dressed in brown and blue
velvet, bordered with gold, comes forth
from its snug retreat when the winter
sun is bright, and wings his way through |
the woods as gayly as he would in mid
summer. His hiding place has been in
the windcracks of an old chestnut tree
or a bunch of clinging leaves. He may
be seen fitting about even when the
snow lies several inches deep. Far off
in the Rocky mountains and among the
Alps of Switzerland butterflies of various
species may often be seen flying over
the snow and the glacier ice.
If we displace the rustling leaves that
cover the ground in the woods we notice
now and then large black beetle run
ming quickly from under our feet. II
snow is on the ground we shall not see
him, but in its absence we shall find
him even on the coolest day. He evil
IDENTIFY knows where to hide himself
when the unwelcome snow and ice
appear.
Whenever wood is still sufficiently
abundant to be used as fuel, insect life
comes forth from rotting chunks that
are carried in and laid near the ire.
When these are picked up in the woods
no signs of such life may appear, but
after being laid in the warm room they
are soon swarming with ants. Some of
them may be of the large black species
and others the smaller red ones When
the heat from the stove or fire. place
reaches them they awake from the
ieath-like torpor into which Jack Frost
had plunged them, often too late to
escape their fate in fiery furnace.
This torpor of insects is very differ
ent condition from the Information of
warm blooded animals, such as the bear
and the marmot. In the latter a slow
and feeble circulation and respira-
lion are kept up and the creature lives
IN the fat that has been stored up in its
body before the winter sleep came on.
Different insects are affected by cold
n very different degrees. Many, like
he common house fly, become torpid
before the temperature falls to the
freezing point. Long before frost comes
hey succumb to the moderate cold of
autumn. There is no doubt that severe
cold winters are attended with great
oea of insaet life which in a nilder