The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1894-03-31
THE BEST OF MIMlcs.


Deception Praetieed By the WALKING
Leaves and walki.g sstcan.
There is perhaps no other group of in
sects which IN form and color are so gen.
orally initiative, and which naturalists
have found moro difficult to detect in
their haunts. Their bodies often resemble
the ronghened bark of the trees among
which they live, or they seem to have
growing to them little fccks OF lichen
or moss. which add to the deception.
The disguise of the walking leaf
Phyllium is the more striking to a nat
uralist because he will notice that
whereas among ali other members of
the tribe the wing-covers when they
EXIST are greatly abbreviated, the very
opposite is true in Phyllium, tn wing
covers, the only members which could
be made to resemble leaf TO perfection.
being greatly developed, while the
wings are greatly aborted, as if the
wing-covers were here developed FOR
the express purpose of this mimicry.
Twenty-Five years ago, at the Jardin
d'Acclimatatiou at Paris, some of these
walking leaves were exhibited alive.
They were placed on growing plants,
from which the larger part of the leaves
were stripped, that the insects might
not too easily conceal themselves. If q
large placard announcing the presence
OF these creatures had not drawn al
tention to them. certainly no one would
have recognized anything extraor-
binary: and even as it was, many a per-
son, after examining the case with care,
left without seeing anything but the
plant, aud with the opinion that
what the placard told them to look
for was some minute ooject too micro
scopic for their sight Even those who
knew what TO expect had often long
search to discover what was in reality
Ia full sight
The same was true Of the living speci-
mems at Edinburgh. OF one of them
Murray says: For the greatest period
Of its life it so exactly resembled the
leaf on which it fed that when visitors
were shown it they usually, after look
ing carefully over the plant for a
minute or two. declared they could see
no insect 1t had then TO be more
infinitely pointed out to them; and al
though seeing is VIGOROUSLY said to be
believing, it looked so absolutely the
same as the leaves among which it rest
ed that this test rarely satisfied them.
and nothing would convince them that
there was a real live insect there but
the test of touch. 1t had to be stirred
up to make it move"
Undoubtedly this initiative resem-
blance is the most striking in the walk
ing leaf, but it Is quite as complete in
many of the walking sticks proper.
The naturalist, Wallace, familiar with
them in tropical forests, says that in
the Moluccas they are found hanging
on the shrubs that line the forest paths;
and they resemble sticks so exactly in
color. in the small rugosities of the
bark. in the knots and small branches
initiated by the joints of the legs,
which are either pressed close to the
body or stuck out at random. that it is
absolutely impossible by the eye alone
to distinguish the real dead twigs
which fall down from the trees over
head from the living insects" And he
adds that he has "often looked at them
in doubt, and has been obliged to use
the sense of touch to determine the
point Samuel ii. Scudder, in Har-
per's Magazine.