struction of a tent, but the early days are not always spent alike, even under similar circumstances, nor is the tent always begun in the same manner. In the State of Çonnecticut, where the season for both plants and insects is much later than in the latitude of Washington, three broods of tent caterpillars were ob- served hatching on April 8 of the same year. These caterpillars also met with dull and chilly weather that kept them huddled on their egg coverings for several days. After four days the temperature moderated suffi- ciently to allow the caterpillars to move about a lit(le on
the twigs, but none was seen
Fro. 146. Young tent caterpillars matted on a fiat sheet of web spun in the crotch between two branches. (About natural size)
feeding (iii the I4th--six days af ter the hatching. Yet they had increased in slze to about one- eighth of an inch in length. Wherever these cater- pillars camped in their wanderings over the small apple trees they inhabit- ed, they spun a carpet of silk to rest upon, and there the whole family collected in such a crowded mass that it looked like a round, furry mat (Fig. I46). The car- pers afforded the cater- pillars a much saler bed than the bare, wet bark of the tree, for if the sleepers shouid become
stupefied by cold the claws of their feet would mechanically hold them fast to the silk during the period of their help- lessness. The test came on the 16th and the night fol- lowing, when the campers were soaked by hard, cold rains
[ 268 ]
THE
