Bulletin of the Illinois State Laboratory of Natural History, Volume 1The Laboratory., 1883 |
Other editions - View all
Common terms and phrases
abdomen abundant Amphipoda anal antennae Aphis Baird bass beetles beneath birds blotches body brown buds Carabidæ carapace carinate caterpillars caudal chiefly Chironomus Cladocera Coleoptera color common Cope Corixa counties CRUSTACEA Darter Diptera dorsal rows dorsal scales dusky eaten Entomostraca Family fishes flagellum Forbes four per cent fruits Fulton Genus Gill Gmel head Hedw Hemiptera honey-tubes Illinois River inches long injurious inner insects joint Jordan Lake Michigan larvæ lateral line legs length Lepidoptera Linn Linnæus male margin Menard Minnow Myriapoda nearly Nelson Neuroptera northern northward Number of specimens Orthoptera outer pair Peoria plants plates posterior postorbitals predaceous Prof Rafinesque ratios Ridgw robin Scudd segments sides slender snout Southern Illinois southward species spines spots stomachs streams subsp Summer sojourner tail taken teeth thoracic three per cent thrush Transient transverse tributaries Undetermined upper vegetable ventrals Wabash Winter sojourner yellow yellowish young
Popular passages
Page 3 - ... study the species with which it comes in competition, and the entire system of conditions affecting their prosperity. Leaving out any of these, he is like one who undertakes to make out the construction of a watch, but overlooks one wheel ; and by the time he has studied all these sufficiently, he will find that he has run through the whole complicated mechanism of the aquatic life of the locality, both animal and vegetable, of which his species forms but a single element.
Page 10 - Perhaps we may, without violence, call these the mountaineers among fishes. Forced from the populous and fertile valleys of* the river beds and lake bottoms, they have taken refuge from their enemies in the rocky highlands where the free waters play in ceaseless torrents, and there they have wrested from stubborn nature a meagre living.
Page 92 - Especially does the wonderful locomotive power of birds, enabling them to escape scarcity in one region which might otherwise decimate them, by simply passing to another more favorable one, without the loss of a life, fit them, above all other animals and agencies, to arrest disorder at the start — to head off aspiring and destructive rebellion before it has had time fairly to make head.
Page 17 - OF ANIMALS. A group or association of animals or plants Is like a single organism in the fact that It brings to bear upon the outer world only the surplus of forces remaining after all conflicts Interior to Itself have been adjusted.
Page 2 - ... work and the play of life goes on in full, but on so small a scale as to bring it easily within the mental grasp. Nowhere can one see more clearly illustrated what may be called the sensibility of such an organic complex, — expressed by the fact that whatever affects any species belonging to it, must speedily have its influence of some sort upon the whole assemblage.
Page 5 - ... 3. The fact that, with the exception of the indigo bird, the species whose records in the orchard were compared with those made elsewhere, had eaten in the former situation as many caterpillars other than canker-worms as usual, simply adding their canker-worm ratios to those of other caterpillars, goes to show that these insects are favorites with a majority of birds.
Page 67 - ... are twice as long as the filaments of the gill. By their interlacing they form a strainer scarcely less effective than the fringes of the baleen plates of the whale, and probably allow the passage of the fine silt of the river bed when this is thrown into the water by the shovel of the fish, but arrest everything as large as the Cyclops. I have not found anything recorded as to the spawning habits of the Paddle-fish. The young have the jaws and palate filled with minute teeth, which disappear...
Page 6 - ... torrents, and there they have wrested from stubborn nature a meager living. Although diminished in size by their constant struggle with the elements, they have developed an activity and hardihood, a vigor of life and a glow of high color almost unknown among the easier livers of the lower lands. * * * Notwithstanding their trivial size, they do not seem to be dwarfed so much as concentrated fishes.
Page 5 - ... of the forest, garden and meadow, those of arboreal and those of terrestrial habit, were certainly either attracted or detained here by the bountiful supply of insect food, and were feeding freely upon the species most abundant. That...