What Crickets Do

Among the humbler creatures of this world are the insects. But they, too, contribute to the pleasures of man's world. The butterflies with their lovely colors, the honeybee's with their sweet treats of honey, the fireflies with their glittering lights, the dragonflies with their voracious appetites, and of course, the crickets, with their cheerful chirping.

The gay song of the cricket has been heralded in the literature and folklore of the people throughout time. It's cheerful little tune has always been a symbol of peace and comfort. In England it was a sign of good luck to have a cricket chirping on the hearth, and to kill one was a breach of hospitality.

The bur-r of the cicada can be nerve-wracking, but the steady chirping of the cricket is calming and comforting. Unless it's happening in a little church, where a Preacher is about to give the sermon!

In China and Japan crickets are revered as musical pets. They are fed lettuce, cucumber, bits of fish, and are given drops of honey now and then as tonic. Cricket food is placed in tiny porcelain dishes by some Chinese cricket-fanciers, and one species, known as the "spinning damsel," is fed nothing but flowers and melons during certain weeks of the year, to improve his tune.

Crickets can be found virtually everywhere--high in the mountains, among swamps, on islands, in the tropics, and even in the Far Northern woods. It was the crickets chirping, millions of years ago, that came long before the frog's croak, the bird's first song, or even the howl of the first wolf. And as it happens so often in nature, only the adult males sing, by scraping wing against wing as many as 5,000 times a second, to produce their musical noises of love.

To a cricket, everything is edible. It is an omnivorous creature, and will dine on dead moles, flowers, vegetables, (like my tomatoes!) and just about anything else edible. And in the late days of summer especially, the chorus of the male cricket is at its height. Meanwhile, at that time of year, the females are busy laying their eggs, placing them just below the surface of the ground with their needle-sharp tails. Then they face the oncoming winter, and their demise, still doing what crickets do--singing their cheerful song, up to the very end.

Thank you Mr. Thomas Fasulo for the use of the graphic.

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