Page:Insects - Their Ways and Means of Living.djvu/244

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the eggs into the twigs of trees and bushes. Ordinarily the ovipositor is kept in a sheath beneath the rear halfof the abdomen, but when in use it can be turned downward and forward by a hinge at its base (Plate 7). The oviposi- tor consists of two

lateral blades, and a  guide-rail ai»ove. The blades excavate a cav-  itv in the wood in- te; which the eggs j are passed through the space between the blades. I t was formcrly sup- posed that the period- ical cicada takes no fod during the brief Flç. 119. blales of the large and small form of the periodical cicada (natural size) rime of its adult lire, but e know from the observations of .lr. W. T. l)avis, l)r. A. !...Quaintance, and others and from a study of the stomach contents made o by the writer that the insects do feed abundantly by st'cking the sap from the trees on which they lire. The cicada, being a near relative of the aphids, has  /  also, as we have already noted, a pierci{ and suck- in belîk by which  it  the punctures plant tissues and r, draws the sap up toitsmouth. ['n- like the other sucking insects v,ç. ,=o.  ,ale of ,e pr,,«a! «iaaa ,i, ,e wings spread, showing the ribbed sound-producing that infest plants, organs, or tympana (Tm),on thebaseofthe abdomen

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