Page:Insects - Their Ways and Means of Living.djvu/330

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the cooler inner chambers, where they remain hidden from view. In the early part of the afternoon a light lunch is taken. The usual hour is one o'clock, but there is no set time. Occasionally the participants appear shortly after eleven, sometimes at noon, and again not until two or three o'clock, and rarely as late as four. As they assemble on the roof of the tent they spin and weave again until all are ready to proceed to the feeding grounds. This meal lasts ai3out an bout. When the caterpillars return to the tent they do a little more spinning before they retire for the afternoon siesta. Luncheon is not always fully attended and is more popular with caterpillars in the .vounger stages, being dispensed with entirely, as we shall see, in the last stage. Dinner, in the evening, is the principal meal of the day, and again there is much variation in the time of service. Daily observations made on rive Connecticut colonies from the 8th to the 26th of May gave six-thirty p.m. as the earliest record for the start of the evening feeding, and nine o'clock as the latest; but the dinner hour is preceded by a great activity of the prospective diners assembled on the outsides of the tents. Though the energy of the tent caterpillars is never excessive, it appears to reach its highest expression at this time. The tent roofs are covered with restless throngs, most of the individuals busily occupied with the weaving of new web, working apparently in desperate haste as if a certain task had been set for them to finish before they should be allowed to eat. Possibly, though, the stimulus comes merely from a congestion of the silk reservoirs in their bodies, and the spinning of the thread affords relief. The tent caterpillar does hOt weave its web in regular loops of thread laid on by a methodical swinging of the head from side to side, which is the method of most caterpillars. It bends the entire body to one side, at-

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