Fulton County tribune. (Wauseon, Ohio) 1883-1925, 1916-07-07
worse THAN BEES
SCORPION is A PEST OF THE
TROPICAL REGIONS.
Its Sting Much Dreaded, Though Sci,
dom Fatal-Creature Has Long
Been Known in the History
Of the World.

The scorpion is a pest Of the tTop-
ical regions. 1t never lives in our lati-
tude. It's resemblance to the spiders
and the crustaceans is quite apparent.
While naturaIists place the scorpions
in the class Arachnida, the class to
which the spiders belong, their super
fetal appearance reminds one of the
class Crustacea, the class to which the
crabs and Holsters belong. The big
pincers, especially, by which they seize
and hold their prey, give to the scoT-
pions the aspect of the crabs and lob
sters
The poison sting of the scorpion is
located at the tip OF the abdomen and
he appears to be fully conscious of his
powerful weapon, R. N. Davis, curator
of the Everhart museum, writes in
Scranton Republican. When running
along the ground he holds the sting
aloft as if to prevent. injury to it by
striking it against the ground. When
it seizes it's prey with its pincers it
searches with the tip of its abdomen
for soft spot in the body of it's prey
and there inserts the poison stinger.
If the animal is OF considerable size
it may sting it more than once. Much
of it's food, such as the eggs of insects
and spiders, is obtained without any
use of the stinger. The stinger is also
used by him as a weapon of defense
against larger animals. In tropical re-
gions the sting of the scorpion is
dreaded as much as we dread the bite
of the rattler. Although the scorpion .
sting is not so severe as tbs bite of a
rattlesnake, it is much worse than the
sting of the bee Fatal stings by the
scorpion are exceedingly rare.
/ am reminded of the scorpions at
this time on account of receiving re
Gently at the museum one of the large
black scorpions from Africa. In Africa
| and India are found the largest of all
the scorpions This African scorpion
is preserved in alcohol and was pre-
sented to the museum by Mrs. E. ].
Lewis, she having received it from
Mrs John JOB of Newark, N. j. There
are several other scorpions in the
museum, but none of them approach
| this specimen in size.
Scorpions appeared quite early in
| the history of the earth, for well-pre-
served remains of them have been
found in the upper siIurian in both
| Europe and America They are found
too, in the carboniferous and these an.
cient forms are very similar to the
| living species. This is unusual in land
animals Most land animals show
/ great changes from one geological age
to the next Marine animals, especial
ly those of the deeper waters, change
very slowly, but land animals change
with comparative rapidity. In the
deeper waters the temperature is al
most constant and the animal is al
ways wet. On the land the tempera
ture varies much in different places
| and in any place the temperature
changes with the day and season. The
amount of moisture from time to time
varies greatly. This variable envir
onment of the land animals tends tC
produce rapid changes and species die
scorpions, however, seem to be some
what exceptional, for the living spe
cies do not differ much from thcst
living away back in paleozoie time
Possibly the nocturnal habits of thes,
animals have had something to do witt
the slight changes the group has un
dergone.