Little Busybodies Part 15

"I could not find either flies or spiders for the babies, and even if there had been a few about I could not have used them, as there was no worker wasp to chew them soft and fine for them. So I made a nice, appetizing syrup of sugar and water, and found that young wasps were as eager for sweets as little children are. They worked their baby mouths busily as long as I had the patience to feed them. When the Vespa family are grown up they eat honey dew from the little aphids, fruit juice, and the nectar from flowers, or, if fortune favors them, they may gain entrance to Mrs. Honey-Bee's home, and feast from her well-filled honeycombs. But the babies all eat insects which their mothers put in the little rooms beside the eggs.

"Mrs. Polistes is a cousin of Mrs. Vespa. She is long and slender, while Mrs. Vespa is rather broad. Her house is a much simpler affair. It has just one layer of rooms suspended by a stem from the under side of a porch, or maybe the eaves, of a house."

"Are there solitary wasps," asked Jimmie, "just as there are solitary bees?"

"Many wasps prefer to live alone rather than in a big house with hundreds of others. They are like bees in their cleverness, knowing how to tunnel in wood, dig deep pits in the ground, or make nests of mud.

Mr. Kellogg, a very wise man, and young to be so wise, tells of one interesting little wasp, called the thread-waisted sand-digger, which lives in California in the salt-marshes. These marshes are covered by plants, but in between are little smooth places covered with a glistening crust of salt. It is in these open spots that Mrs.

Sand-Digger makes her home. She has strong jaws, and with these she cuts out a neat little circle of salty crust. Then she begins to dig a tunnel, humming away to herself all the time. After the hole is ready she very carefully backs out of it and puts a circular door on.

"Then she flies away to find food to store up for her children. These babies like tender, green inch-worms, so Mrs. Digger-Wasp hunts around until she finds a fat one, and then proceeds to paralyze it, so that it will stay quietly in the house until the babies are ready to eat it, for baby digger-wasps are little cannibals, preferring living caterpillars to any pre-digested spiders or flies. It is very wonderful that Mrs.

Digger-Wasp knows where to sting a caterpillar in order to paralyze it and yet not kill it. But she does. Perhaps you remember that insects have knots of nerve cells, connected by nerve threads, extending from one end of the body to the other? Jimmie remembers that I pinched him to ill.u.s.trate this point. The knot on the top of the food-tubes is the brain, then underneath there are usually three in the thorax and several in the abdomen. Well, Mrs. Digger-Wasp stings one or more of these little knots, which we call ganglia. That paralyzes the young inch-worm, so that it becomes limp and helpless, but still lives. Then Mrs. Wasp picks it up and carries it to her house, and packs it in the bottom of the tunnel.

"After putting in five or ten she lays an egg, fastening it on the body of one of the worms. She backs out of the tunnel, and flies off to collect b.a.l.l.s of dirt. With these she fills up the tunnel completely.

Carefully she puts the little round door on. One day some one saw her do a curious thing. She wished to be very sure that the door was fast shut.

Perhaps it did not fit well. So she found a tiny pebble, held it in her jaws, and hammered the door down with it. Wasn't that a clever thing for a wasp to do? The door closed, this is all the attention she gives to baby digger-wasps. She has put in plenty of food, even for the hungriest larva. Now it must look out for itself, eat, grow fat and strong, and then dig its way out into the salt-marsh.

"Mrs. Eumenes is a good-looking little wasp dressed in black and yellow.

She is a mason, making a pretty mud vase for a home. The clay, or mud, she moistens, then moulds it, little by little, into the vase, which she fastens on to a twig. Some mud-daubers make small cylinders placed side by side. Into these they put stung spiders, after tearing off their legs to make sure they will not recover and run away before the eggs hatch.

Sometimes the mud-daubers plaster up the keyholes in a house, and so have snug homes.

"One day last summer, as I was sitting outside my cabin, I noticed a wasp carrying something green in its mouth. It came close to my head, then finally crawled up under the shingles on the side wall. All the afternoon it came and went, each time bringing something green. The next afternoon I was loading my guns, and had put a hollow gun-barrel on a table at my side. Soon I heard a whir of insect wings, and there, on the table, was my wasp friend. It walked up and down, examining very carefully the hollow barrel, then cautiously it crawled in. In about five minutes it crawled out again and flew away. Soon it was back with a piece of green in its mouth. It crawled into the barrel and left the green. Six times the wasp did this; then my curiosity became so great I could wait no longer. When she flew away I tapped the barrel on the table and emptied out six little green worms, all limp and still. But Mrs. Wasp was back again, and I guiltily withdrew. She had brought the seventh worm, and when she saw the six lying on the table she was much puzzled. She went around and poked each one to see whether it was limp, fearing, perhaps, that she had not stung them hard enough; but, finding them helpless, she picked them up one by one and patiently carried them back into the gun-barrel. Three times I emptied them out, and three times she put them back, then flew away, never to return. I suppose the last time she went in she laid the egg among the little worms, and then, her duty done, was off to find another good place to start a family.

"Have you ever seen a big cicada which makes the long, rasping sound in the trees? Some wasps like these very much for food. So, when cicada sings, Mrs. Wasp swoops down on it, stings it, and then, big and clumsy as it is, carries it to her home for her children to feast upon."

"A cicada is three or four times as large as a wasp, isn't it?" asked Mrs. Reece.

"Yes; but there is nothing the wasps can't do," replied Ben Gile.

"I should think not!" exclaimed Peter, who by this time was able to smile again.

"The trout are ready, Ben," said Adam, "and everything else, too, I guess."

With running and laughter the children were soon about the fire, eating their last delicious out-of-door dinner.

XVI

EYES AND NO EYES

The evening party at Ben Gile's cabin was to be the last of all the beautiful summer, for the next day Betty and Jimmie were to leave with their mother for the city, and this was the evening which was to decide who was to receive the prize.

Betty had been working very hard for it, and wanted it. But Jimmie couldn't see any use in lying with your nose on an ant-hill. As for Peter, he giggled whenever ants were mentioned to him, and seemed not to care much one way or another. Hope, however, was often with Betty, and the two girls, flat on the gra.s.s, tried to discover as many mysteries as they could about the busy little fellows. As for Jack, he was as busy as the ants, following them about, lying quietly for hours, and borrowing any book he could find that would tell about them. It seemed to him that if he could have that magnifying-gla.s.s, that book of colored plates, and the five-dollar gold piece, he would be the richest boy in all the world! He thought about it by night and by day, and he was certain that with the insect book and the gla.s.s, he should discover things n.o.body else in the world had ever seen.

The poor boy was trembling with eagerness on this evening of the party at the guide's cabin. The children took their turn in telling what they knew. Peter giggled, and said they seemed to lug a good deal of food.

Jimmie said they ran in and out of their ant hills very fast, and knew how to build big hills. Hope was so frightened that, when it came her turn, the child could not tell even the little she knew.

But Betty, who loved everything in the out-of-door world, forgot herself and her fright in the true love which she had for natural history. She said she had spent hours in a neighborhood of ants, near the doorways they had in the ground. Some of the doorways were large, and some were small, and the little ants who went in and out of the doors carried off the pieces of cake she fed to them. Sometimes the crumbs were three or four times as big as the ants. She had seen two little ants attack a large piece of cake, but it proved too much for them, so one mounted guard over it while the other scurried off. In a few moments it came back with a whole squad of ants, who surrounded the cake and pushed and pulled with all their might. They actually got it to the door, Betty said, and after that she could see it no more. Then Betty spoke a little wistfully: "If only I had been an ant I could have gone down after it. I could have seen what they did with it, sir."

"Well, my dear," said Ben Gile, "if you want to see what they do, start a colony of them some day in a gla.s.s case. That will solve a good many of your problems. And now, what else?"

"I saw them doing a good deal that was interesting, sir, but I couldn't understand it."

"It's your turn, Jack. We will come back to Betty by-and-by."

"I found out, sir, that in every ant colony there are always three kinds of ants--the queens, the males, and the workers. It's much like what you told us of the bees. And it seemed to me, sir, every time I looked at them, that they were happy together, busy with their work and never quarrelling with one another. I suppose they were happy because each one had some special work to do. I looked it all up in the books, and I found that some are born queens, to be waited on, while others are born workers, to do the serving. But they are all contented.

"The queen ant is not a real queen ruling a little kingdom; she is the mother ant, and lays all the eggs. She is well cared for and protected by the workers. These are the active little ants who do the work. They are happy, too, running about, digging new pa.s.sageways, clearing the paths to their front doors, and bringing in food, which they store in their granaries. Some ants, sir, build their tunnels very deep underground. A doorway opens into a wide gallery, from which others branch and wind their way down into the dark ground. Sometimes they build a high mound around the entrance, and often a large colony will have many such mounds."

[Ill.u.s.tration: _A._ Honey ant.

_B._ Ants exchanging greetings.]

"Some ants," added Ben Gile, "dig out their homes in dead logs or hollow stems. I know of one little fellow who is clever enough to build a shed.

It hunts around to find decayed wood. This it chews into a fine pulp, then spreads it out into a roof; sometimes it is a good-sized roof. This same ant dearly loves the honeydew which aphids secrete. So in order to protect these helpless little green bugs, and make them as comfortable and contented as possible, they build a neat shed over them. When the ants wish a dainty luncheon of honeydew they crawl up under the little shed and get a drink of this sweet juice. Although a colony of ants lives together so peacefully, Jack, they are apt to be very quarrelsome with their neighbors; often they go to war with another colony if the members of that colony happen to trespa.s.s on their grounds."

"I found out about some naughty, lazy ants, sir. Instead of taking care of their own homes and hunting up their own food, they go out to war against another kind of ant, which is living quietly and attending to its own business. All the grown-up ants these little fighters either kill or frighten so that they run away as fast and as far as their legs will carry them. Then these lazy ants steal the eggs and the babies.

Some of them they eat on the way home, but most of them they carry to their underground galleries. There they take good care of them until they are grown up. Then these stolen babies become the slaves of the lazy ants; but the poor little slaves have never known any other life, so they cheerfully serve their masters, doing everything for them; in fact, so long have these masters had little slaves to wait upon them that they do not know at all how to look out for themselves. They have been known to starve to death rather than to feed themselves."

"But there are many respectable ants," objected Ben Gile, "and I will tell you how a well-regulated household behaves. One day last summer, when I was walking in the afternoon, I found myself suddenly surrounded by a cloud of winged insects--thousands and thousands of them. I caught one of them and found that it was a winged ant, for the males and queens have wings with which to fly away on their wedding journey. This journey lasts only a short time, and usually many colonies fly up together in the bright summer air. The wedding journey is a picnic for hungry birds.

Just think of finding such a ma.s.s of juicy morsels at one time. They fly into the crowd and eat as many of the ants as they can. But many escape.

At last they become exhausted. The males fall to the ground and die. The queens break off their wings, because they never need them after the wedding journey.

"They look about for a good place to start a new home. The first thing the queen does is to lay her eggs in a neat little pile. These soon hatch out into larvae; tiny, worm-like grubs without any legs. Queen ants feed their babies faithfully with nice, tender insects, which they chew for them. Sometimes these larvae spin a tiny coc.o.o.n, in which they lie quietly while they are being made over into ants--perhaps into a queen, like the mother, or a male, like the father; perhaps into a worker, which is the mainstay of the whole colony. This first family of babies the queen mother must look out for herself, but just as soon as the baby workers are grown up it is their turn to help her.

"The first set of workers are very small. From morning until night they are busy. Early in the morning they must go out for food, to catch insects for the queen's breakfast and for the queen's baby ants. To be sure, it does not take long to prepare this meal, as it is chewed for the babies instead of cooked. Then the house must be set to rights, extra grains of sand must be cleared out of the paths and galleries.

Perhaps some careless little girl or boy may have stepped on the mound around the entrance and crushed it. The workers hurry to clear away the ruins, and soon have a new mound neatly piled up. Tell us, Jack, what you know about these workers."

Jack's face was bright with eagerness. "Well, sir, in ant homes there are always babies, lots of them, just as in other homes. These little larvae must be fed often and kept clean. The workers are the nurses as well as housekeepers. If the babies happen to be in a cool, damp part of the house they must be carried into a warmer, drier place. So the workers pick them up and take them out for an airing. Often they carry the little coc.o.o.ns out into the warm sunshine or move them about from place to place. In some families of ants there are some with very big heads and strong jaws. These are the soldiers. If there is any trouble in their village these big-headed fellows go out as scouts or act as sentinels around the ant-hill. But the head of the worker is rather small. It's a clever head, though, sir. On it are two antennae, bent, sir, like sharp little elbows. You told us that ants talk with their antennae. These feelers are very sensitive. I watched two ants one day and saw them rubbing them together."

"I am sure," said Ben Gile, "that some very exciting and interesting conversations are carried on by these fellows."

"Back of the head," continued Jack, "is the thorax, with the six legs, then a very narrow piece joining the thorax and abdomen."

"I know of one ant," added the guide, "who is nothing more or less than a honey-jar. This honey-ant hangs by its legs from the roof of its home.

The little workers go out and visit the oak-trees and hunt around for b.a.l.l.s called oak galls. From these they get honey, which they carry home and feed to the little fellows hanging on the ceiling by their heels.

The honey is stored away in their crops. All day these honey-jar ants are fed, until the abdomens are as big as a currant, and the sweet, yellow honey shines through the skin. When any of the family gets hungry it crawls up to one of these fat little fellows and takes a refreshing sip."

"I know of another ant," began Jack, who could scarcely wait to begin, "who lives in the home of a larger ant. This one builds small tunnels connected with the large ones of the big ant, but is careful to make the doorways so small that the big ones cannot creep in and eat up the babies. When Little Ant gets hungry it crawls up on Big Ant's back. Very gently it strokes its head, then licks its cheek until the mouth of Big Ant fairly waters. This is just what Little Ant intends the mouth shall do. It laps up the drop of sweetness, crawls down, climbs on the back of another big ant, and has a second luncheon. Sometimes little thief ants live in other ants' houses, stealing the food which the workers have been so busy collecting all the long day."

By this time the children were listening in open-eyed astonishment to Jack, who had absorbed so much of the spirit and the information of the old guide that he could talk almost as interestingly.

"Mother aphids," interrupted Ben Gile, "who like corn very well, lay their eggs at the roots of the corn. But if the babies hatch out before the corn roots are ready there is a family of ants who come to the rescue. They carry these babies over to some other roots, where they may feed until the corn roots grow. Later they carry them carefully back again. Of course, they do not do this because they care for the welfare of the aphids, but because they know if the little corn lice have plenty to eat they themselves will have plenty of honeydew, which they love."

"And there's a harvester, sir, who builds a big mound around its front door and carefully clears away the gra.s.s. Into the long galleries of its home it carries a great many seeds, and stores them away. All the chaff and hard parts which it cannot eat it carries out again."

"Leading up to the big mound," added Ben Gile, "are clear pathways as distinct as any path you or I make through the gra.s.sy fields. Perhaps ants are too little to do very much thinking, but they do many things which you and I would have to think about a long time before we should be able to do them. They have a good government which runs along without friction. They can build roads, dig tunnels, spin silken webs, build sheds, go to war, harvest grain into the storehouses, and keep a farm of aphids."