The Grangeville globe. [volume] (Grangeville, Idaho) 1907-1922, 1914-06-18
NY LIFETIME AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF
A CRAYEIsh.

A CRAvFisH.
The story of the life of a crayfish
which follows was written by Helen
Erskine and WAS part of the regular
work In the biology course In the
Grangeville high school this year. This
paper was awarded first prize in the
class contest The facts as given by
the author OF this autobiography are
true TO life and 1t is hoped they are
told so that the reader win enjoy find
ing out about the life OF this common
but little understood animal-K. B. b.
The first thing l can remember is of
waking one evening and finding myself
attached to one OF my mothers swim
merets Cor little swimming feep hang
ing on by one Of my claws of pinchers.
thought / should like to walk about
alone for while. but could not unfas-
ten my pincher, so had TO stay where
was. There were a number of us
children. all fastened in the same man
ner, and, as my mothers swimmerets
are on the under side OF her abdomen
we did not have very much room and
so used to quarrel and pinch one an
other. OF course this was not very
nice OF us. but we liked 1t so long as
we were not getting pinched.
In the daytime my mother backed in
TO hole in the bank of the stream
or under rock. and as we were crowd
ed and in the dark, all of the children
slept. Then at night mother would
take us out on the bank and hunt some
thing for us TO eat One night she
found dead fish, and what feast
We had, and another night crayfish
who lived nearby got too close, so
mother just pulled off one of his claws
and we ate It,
/ was now about three fourths OF an
inch long My beautiful grayish shell
was getting too tight for me and so
] felt very uncomfortable. so ! squirm-
ed around on my back and began to
rub my many legs together and to kick,
to see IL that would not help. Then,
all at once my shell cracked just be-
hind my cape; that felt so much better
] pushed my back out through the
crack a little way to give me more room.
1t was extremely hard work, SO ! had
to rest for a long time. After that
pulled out my legs one at a time and
then my head-how good l felt. /
was SO glad l just gave one great kick
and the abdomen and tail part of my
body was out of its she'll This last great
effort exhausted me terribly, so that l
could scarcely move, so / lay down and
rested right where ! was. for a long
time After while ] looked around
and to my great surprise found that I
was no longer attached to my mother.
Some of my brothers and sisters were
coming out of their old houses too
One of my brothers, poor fellow. could
not get one of his pinchers out, so he
had to pun It off. My weakest little
sister couldn't get out at all and the
exertion Of the hard struggle killed her.
My new coat was so soft that any
thing hard hurt me. so / went down
into the mud and stayed until my new
coat became little harder. How fast
] grew while my coat was soft.
went out at night to the bank and
found food. would clutch the food
with my pinchers and tear 1t to pieces
being helped by the peculiar little pinch
ers and teeth in my mouth-then would
chew 1t thoroughly with some curious
teeth In my stomach
When my shell was good and hard
felt brave and went a long way every
night One night got into a fight
with another crayfish and pinched off
one of his legs, which / ate. Another
night ! found another crayfish smaller
than myself which had just moulted-
an excellent juicy supper 1t made
One day when l was about two years
old some people came along with some
big hoops with white sacks on them
One Of the boys put the sack down be-
low the rock under which I was hid
ing so i had 10 swim away Al al
ways swim downstream and backwards