The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1903-10-19
THEY PROTECT THEMSELVES.
Animals Which Take on n Likeness
to Surrounding Objects.

G. w. Beebe, in New York Tribune.
The world of nature is full OF wonders in
form and color, and when we discover their
use we find that they contribute to the in
dividuals advantage in the worldwide life
and death game of the hide and seek which
animals are forever playing with one an
other
What an advertisement of his power is
the black and white coat of the skunk
How we'll it is seconded by his noncha-
liant manner, fearless of the world, which
in any other less to be dreaded creature
would assure its speedy extinction. Notice
the snowy cotton tail of the rabbit. which.
furled until the last moment. at the critical
jump is flashed out in a terror signal to
all of it's kind.
When fear comes, how wonderfully the
timid creatures of the wild shrink into
copies of surrounding OBJECTS: how their
colors, forms, shapes eloquently spell,
There is nothing here but bark, but a
stone; this is only an inedible branch, a
bit of moss, a patch of sunlight" How
this magic came to be need not concern
us now; let US simply notice some of the
more remarkable instances.
Did you ever hear one of the minor play
ers in springs symphony, that trembling
little ditty that proclaims a tiny tree toad
He calls loudly for his mate, but II is in
from first one direction, then another Even
when we are standing directly before the
little musician, the cloak Of invisibility still
surrounds him. He clings with his twenty
sucker toes to the trunk, perhaps of some
white oak where the markings of his back
merge with exquisite exactness with the
surrounding linchen etched bark. Defense
less little creature, that he is, he can call
and croak his love song in safety, sharp
as are the eyes Of his enemies.
Another sound comes through the April
as a hound his muzzle, we come upon a
great bullfrog, SQuatting bowlegged upon a
piece of moss half under the water For a
time he will battle US, for the green of his
head and back seems but part of the pool
slime, and how cleverly the queer bend In
his back destroys all appearance of SYM
metry, making him but misshapeu bit of
swamp moss!
1t is a far cry from a New England
swamp to the Desert Of Sahara, and from a
lowly bullfrog to the greatest OF all birds.
but even the latter has enemies, and the
sand-colored lion is a terrible foe. When
the ostrich is awake his speed leaves all
terrors behind. but when alseep, or when
the male bird is patiently brooding his
great nest full of eggs. death is often
near. The untold myriads of sand grains
forever being piled up by the desert ants
are the safeguard of the ostrich. He set
ties low down on the sand. bending his long
legs under him and fiattening out his head
and neck until they are lost TO view. Up
to this time he was an ostrich. a gigantic
other anthill among a thousand.
There are some examples of protection
which are hard to explain. For instance,
what enemies can the young of the osprey
be supposed to have-not the helpless naked
things of the first week, or month old, full
sized birds, almost ready to fly? We ap-
proach nest when the parents are away
fishing. and these big birds greet us fierce
ly, with open beaks and threatening talons.
A more conspicuous nestfull could not well
be imagined. but now far overhead the
fhnr f9cll IN oxrrE NJ q ~r.
shrek of alarm, down drops each osprey
ling, prone upon the nest. Unless we ex-
anime the mass carefully, IL is .mpossi-
BILE to tell where the feathers OF the young
birds end and the seaweed and debris Of
the nest begin. We may lift the head OF
one of the birds foot more from the
without a motion of life; all threatening
all aggressiveness, has vanished at the first
warning cry Of the parent.
The color of sand is mimicked by many
creatures, one of the most wonderful be-
ing the well named spirit crabs of our
Southern coasts. Sit quietly on the sand
for five minutes, and portions of IL will soon
appear to become animated and TO move In
various directions. Raise so much as a
finger, and-sand TO sand returns. Not a
portion of these queer daylight ghosts but is
notified with the light gray OF their habi-
tat. Two feet away, and the eye refuses &c
dfferentiate them. No wonder their holes
dot the beach in myriads.
If we have observed this little miracle on
the sandy shore of a coral key, let US walk
inland to where the beautiful cocoanui
palms rear their tall, filmy mass of fronds
The ground is Uttered with unripe cocoa
nuts, and. although We should be prepared
for almost any surprise In this wonderland
of nature. yet IL is rather disconcertine
when several of these nuts protrude eight
legs and scramble away. Cocoanut crabs
| of course, with hard brown backs and nea,
pockets in which eye-stalks, jaws, feelers
claws and legs may be packed away SC
| carefully that there results-a cocoanut-
| identical except in internal constitution
| Dante, when he came TO the forest OF
| human souls, on his ramble in the neither
| regions, experienced, perhaps. the same
| feeling which one has in walking through
| such a cocoanut grove, knowing that tiny
| eyes are peering out among the very nuts
Let us not leave our Florida key before
| we have entered some live oak jungle where
| the shadows are filtered through the mar.
| row Sits OF palmetto fronds. big vel
| low butterfly fits past. We frighten IL by
a sudden motion and Ii vanishes. Their,
are many lines hanging near where the dis
/ appearance took place, but even will
| ing creduity will not let us believe thai
| the butterfly has turned into a lime. No
| but the insect has done something little less
| wonderful When alarmed IL must have
| flown TO the nearest lime with lightning
| dart, alighting on the side nearest US. anC
| closed it's wings, becoming, as We at las
| discovered IL, an all but invisible line on tn,
| yellow fruit.
Slow FLYING Heliconia butterflies, movinI
1 like soaring birds, come past US, threading
| the tangle of vines and fronds. Their broad
/ oblong expanse of velvety black. marked
| with oblique lines and dots OF yellow, give
| them a beauty which evades description
1 These at least seem never meant for con
| cealment Yet two of them. after hoverin,
| about each other. alight near together ans
dissolve Into their surroundings-the darl
leaves emo the lines OF sunlight.
And SO the great life game Is played W.