OUR PUBLIC SCHOOLS COLUMN

Otago Witness, Issue 3034, 8 May 1912, Page 72

OUR PUBLIC SCHOOLS COLUMN

FOR SENIORS AND JONIORS

(Conducted by Magistee, to whom all com munications must be addressed.)

[Magister will bo glad to receive Nature notes, marked papers containing educational articles, diagrams, details of experiments, etc., of scholastic interest toteachern and pupils. Correspondents must use onl* one side of the paper, and whether using & pen name or not, must send both name and ADDRESS.]

SOME NOTES ON BEETLES. Some time ago I promised a note or two on beetles, having more particularly in mind the Prionus reticularis, the largest beetle we have, and developed from the big fat grub' we find in decaying wood — and other wood, too! To commence with: What is a beetle? It belongs to a class of insects called Coleoptera, a word which means " sheath or case-winged." You will notice that a beetle has two pairs of wings—the upper pair, hard and. bony, protect the under pair, and each of these is called an elytrum (plu. elytra). Before we go" any further, let us note the root " pter." * It occurs in Aptera (wingless), a class of animals without wings—the flea, louse, etc. ; in Apteryx, the name of one of our wingless birds; in Diptera (two-winged)—the mosquito, gnat, common midge, glow-worm, the fly, etc. ; the Hemiptera (half-winged), which are divided into (a) llomoptera (samewinged), both pairs being .similar in texture but not overlapping —the cicada, aphis, etc. ; (b) Heteroptera (differentwinged)—the bug, cochineal insect, most of the insect life frequenting trees; Lepidoptera (scale-winged)—moths and butterflies; Orthoptera (straight-winged) —grasshoppers, cockroaches, crickets, termites, dragonflies, mayflies, etc. ; Hymenoptera (membranous winged)— ants, wasps, bees, etc. ; Neuroptera (nerve-winged or reticu-lated-winged)—stoneflies, lacewings, etc. (formerly termites, dragonflies, and mayflies were included in this order) ; Pterodactyl (wing-fingered), the name of an ancient monster somewhat like an immense bat; and so on. Another point. What is an insect'? You will remember that the question was raised in these columns a month ago; but we shall keep to the generally accepted scientific definition that it has six legs. Here is Hudson's definition —a good working'one: "An insect is an articulate animal having the body divided into three distinct divisions —viz., the. head, the thorax, and the abdomen. It is furnished with three pairs of legs, and generally has two pairs of wings, and to acquire this structure the creature passes through several changes, termed its metamorphoses." A beetle may also be called a hexapod (six-footed), because it has six feet or legs. Again, it is a non-vertebrate or invertebrate because it has no backbone. Its skin might be said to be horny or bony, and it is called chitin, frorn a Greek word meaning a tunic, so it might be regarded as an animal with the skin on the outside and acting as a coat-of-mail. The Coleoptera have perfect metamorphoses, passing through the successive stages of egg, larva (grub), pupa (chrysalis,) and arriving at the imago or perfect insect. " The name was first used by Aristotle, who noticed the firm protective sheaths, serving as covering for the hind wings, which alone are used for flight, without recognising their correspondence with the forewings of other insects." " These firm forewings, or elytra, are usually convex above with straight hind margins (dorsa) ; when the elytra are closed the two hind margins come together along the mid-dorsal line of the body, forming a suture. In many beetles the hind wings are reduced to mere vestige, useless for flight, or are altogether absent, and in such cases the two elytra are often fused together at the suture; thus organs usually intended for flight have been transformed into an armour-like covering for the beetle's hindbody. In correlation with their heavy build and the frequent loss -of the power of flight, many beetles are terrestrial rather than aerial in habit, though a large proportion of the order can fly well. "Aristotle's term was adopted by Linnams (1758), and has been universally used by zoologists." —Encyclopaedia Britannica. (To be continued.) CORRESPONDENCE AND NOTES. Reginald Francis (Caversham) sends me the following nice little note. If Reggie will leave the moth at the Daily Times office for me I shall try to name it. Or, better still, one of the Caversham teachers takes more than the average amount of interest in Nature study, and if Reggie can get half an hour in school to look over my volume of " Moths and Butterflies," arid if the teacher will call at the Daily Times office for the volume I will allow Reggie to have it for a day. He will then know what a great deal of study can be put to these interesting creatures. Is that a bargain, Reggie? Let me know. Dear " Magister,"—We have a very large moth, ljin in length. In front of its head are two large black eyes and a pair of light brown feathery feelers. Its thorax, from which come two pair of wings, is covered with soft hair, like fur. The upper wings are brown and white, but the under ones are of a light brown colour. Its abdomen, which is made up of a number of rings and tapei'3 to a point, has three little clusters of fur at the end. It has six legs, the upper parts of which are covered with fur. It is a very pretty specimen.—Yours truly, Reginald.

Dear " Magister,"—On April 1 I found an insect. It had a long body, six light brown legs, and feelers about half an inch long. It had two brown wings, which

were very hard to see, because it kept them so close to its body. It had a little green on the thorax. I am sending it to see if you can tell me its name.—Yours truly, " David. (10 years.) [A nicely written letter Dave, but 1 have overlooked your specimen. I'll see what I can do for you next week.]

To Karaka, via Gisborne, April 17. Dear " Magister,"—l am sending in a match-box a " beastie " that I found hopping round in my house this morning. As I have not seen anything like it before I should like if you would name it in your column in the Otago Witness. — Yours soncerely, " Lil."

[Are you sure that it was hopping about ""Lil "? It is a mantis. It belongs to the Orthoptera order. According to Hudson it is, as far as he knew, confined to the South Island. "It seldom flies, but crawls stealthily about the trunks of trees, in the hottest sunshine, capturing and destroying great quantities of insects, its green colouring and leaf-like form rendering it very inconspicuous to his victims." 1 do not think I am crediting " Lil ".with the wrong specimen.] April 20. Dear " Magister,"—You are aware that a fungus attacks the glory pea (Clianthus puniceus) and theatens to blot it out of our list of showy flowering native plants. The fungus causes the young leaves to bunch together in great unsightly brown masses as the birch also does when attacked with fungoid growths. I forward you a specimen of the pods of this pea affected by some disease. You will notice the inner skin of the pod alone has been developed and that instead of forming a thick pod only a dry bladder has been produced, with immature seeds which are easily shaken out. Whether these seeds have any germinating power I have yet to find out. The pods were given to me, so I did not see the plant in a flowering state, but the condition of the shoot showed that the young leaves at the end had been killed. Other shoots attacked were in the same condition, so evidently the disease affects the whole branchlet. I sen! portion of a normal pod, the seeds of which are snugly enclosed in a warm blanket of hairs and further protected by the inner skin and the other layers of the pod, the whole forming a thick succulent pod. Perhaps you can get some light thrown on this disease.—l am, etc., Student. [I wish I could explain what fungus " Student " refers to, its action, and how overcome. Perhaps some reader can.] Doar " Magister,"—The proposal to mend spelling rem hide me of putting new wine into old bottles. It will burst. The very words quoted show that the difficulty is not known. The fluent expert reader sees a line at a time, and every letter of every word as he reads. Such a one has no difficulty with spelling. One who has a good visual memory of the formation of a word delights as he progresses in gaining knowledge in learning the origin of words. Only yesterday when lying thinking a near companion said to me, " I have sinovitis of the knee; what is that?" The roots of the word quickly gave the meaning. Should such knowledge be considered worthless for the sake of simplifying the spelling of words? But can we simplify spelling? The child who cannot learn honour will probably spell it honer, perhaps homier. A simple story, which I happened to read this week, illustrates the difficulty of phonetic spelling. How many youngsters would keep to the forms here shown : " I herd you say I cood not stay here enny longer, and other peeple sed nobuddy wood have me." Compel a youngster to write this as I have written it, and the same difficulties will arise. If a year is to be saved it must be a case of go as you please. Each one writing as each one hears means that each hears differently ; and further, so few read or speak correctly. And what are the chief errors of voungsters ? The pronunciation of words alike, though not absolutely alike, i 6 a constant source of error—their, there; hear, here; where, were; etc. I had an amusing incident brought under my notice this week. It will illustrate writing according to enunciation. A master told the scholars to write dictation as it was read. In the Third Standard he chose a boy whom his fellow s knew to be a bit of a cockney. Attic Watts immediately whispered. " Now mind and write as he reads.'' The result was the misplacement of the letter " 1," and other errors which the youngsters delighted in writing as they were read. One letter in the alphabet is a frequent source of errors—the letter " c." It may be sounded "k " or as " s." Would you epell " accident " as " aksident." or as the youngsters do, " axident "? The whole question is like the supposed play of the kindergarten. Nothing is play that you are compelled to do. The poor speller will find as much trouble over the supposed reform as he now finds. — I am, etc., Avrohom.