Essays Upon Heredity and Kindred Biological Problems

Sarcophaga carnaria. The female fly dies ten to twelve hours after the birth of the viviparous larvae; the time intervening between the exit from the cocoon and the birth of the young is not given (Oken, quoting Réaumur, ‘Mém. p. s. à l’hist. Insectes,’ Paris, 1740-48, IV).

Musca domestica. In the summer the common house-fly begins to lay eggs eight days after leaving the cocoon: she then lays several times. (See Gleichen, ‘Geschichte der gemeinen Stubenfliege,’ Nuremberg, 1764.)

Eristalis tenax. The larva of this large fly lives in liquid manure, and has been described and figured by Réaumur as the rat-tailed larva. I kept a female which had just emerged from the cocoon, from August 30th till October 4th, in a large gauze-covered glass vessel. The insect soon learnt to move freely about in its prison, without attempting to escape; it flew round in circles, with a characteristic buzzing sound, and obtained abundant nourishment from a solution of sugar, provided for it. From September 12th it ceased to fly about, except when frightened, when it would fly a little way off. I thought that it was about to die, but matters took an unexpected turn, and on the 26th of September it laid a large packet of eggs, and again on the 29th of the same month another packet of similar size. The flight of the animal had been probably impeded by the weight of the mass of ripe eggs in its body. The deposition of eggs was probably considerably retarded in this case, because fertilization had not taken place. The fly died on the 4th of October, having thus lived for thirty-five days. Unfortunately, I have been unable to make any experiments as to the duration of life in the female when males are also present.

VI. Lepidoptera

I am especially indebted to Mr. W. H. Edwards[11 - Mr. Edwards has meanwhile published these communications in full; cf. ‘On the length of life of Butterflies,’ Canadian Entomologist, 1881, p. 205.], of Coalburgh, W. Virginia, and to Dr. Speyer, of Rhoden, for valuable letters relating to this order.

The latter writes, speaking of the duration of life in imagos generally:—‘It is, to my mind, improbable that any butterfly can live as an imago for a twelvemonth. Specimens which have lived through the winter are only rarely seen in August, even when the summer is late. A worn specimen of Vanessa cardui has, for instance, been found at this time’ (‘Entomolog. Nachrichten,’ 1881, p. 146).

In answer to my question as to whether the fact that certain Lepidoptera take no solid or liquid food, and are, in fact, without a functional mouth, may be considered as evidence for an adaptation of the length of life to the rapid deposition of eggs, Dr. Speyer replies:—‘The wingless females of the Psychidae do not seem to possess a mouth, at any rate I cannot find one in Psyche unicolor (graminella). They do not leave the case during life, and certainly do not drink water. The same is true of the wingless female of Heterogynis, and of Orgyia ericae, and probably of all the females of the genus Orgyia; and as far as I can judge from cabinet specimens, it is probably true of the males of Heterogynis and Psyche. I have never seen the day-flying Saturnidae, Bombycidae, and other Lepidoptera with a rudimentary proboscis, settle in damp places, or suck any moist substance, and I doubt if they would ever do this. The sucking apparatus is probably deficient.’

In answer to my question as to whether the males of any species of butterfly or moth are known to pass a life of different length from that of the female, Dr. Speyer stated that he knew of no observations on this point.

The following are the only instances of well-established direct observations upon single individuals, in my possession[12 - When no authority is given, the observations are my own.]:—

Pieris napi, var. bryoniae [male] and [female], captured on the wing: lived in confinement ten days, and were then killed.

Vanessa prorsa lived at most ten days in confinement.

Vanessa urticae lived ten to thirteen days in confinement.

Papilio ajax. According to a letter from Mr. W. H. Edwards, the female, when she leaves the pupa, contains unripe eggs in her body, and lives for about six weeks—calculating from the first appearance of this butterfly to the disappearance of the same generation[13 - In the paper quoted above, Edwards, after weighing all the evidence, reduces the length of life from three to four weeks.]. The males live longer, and continue to fly when very worn and exhausted. A worn female is very seldom seen;—‘I believe the female does not live long after laying her eggs, but this takes some days, and probably two weeks.’

Lycaena violacea. According to Mr. Edwards, the first brood of this species lives three to four weeks at the most.

Smerinthus tiliae. A female, which had just emerged from the pupa, was caught on June 24th; on the 29th pairing took place; on the 1st of July she laid about eighty eggs, and died the following day. She lived nine days, taking no food during this period, and she only survived the deposition of eggs by a single day.

Macroglossa stellatarum. A female, captured on the wing and already fertilized, lived in confinement from June 28th to July 4th. During this time she laid about eighty eggs, at intervals and singly; she then disappeared, and must have died, although the body could not be found among the grass at the bottom of the cage in which she was confined.

Saturnia pyri. A pair which quitted the cocoons on the 24th or 25th of April, remained in coitu from the 26th until May 2nd—six or seven days; the female then laid a number of eggs, and died.

Psyche graminella. The fertilized female lives some days, and the unfertilized female over a week (Speyer).

Solenobia triquetrella. ‘The parthenogenetic form (I refer to the one which I have shown to be parthenogenetic in Oken’s ‘Isis,’ 1846, p. 30) lays a mass of eggs in the abandoned case, soon after emergence. The oviposition causes her body to shrivel up, and some hours afterwards she dies. The non-parthenogenetic female of the same species remains for many days, waiting to be fertilized; if this does not occur, she lives over a week.’ ‘The parthenogenetic female lives for hardly a day, and the same is true of the parthenogenetic females of another species of Solenobia’ (S. inconspicuella?). Letter from Dr. Speyer.

Psyche calcella, O. The males live a very short time; ‘those which leave the cocoon in the evening are found dead on the following morning, with their wings fallen off, at the bottom of their cage.’ Dr. Speyer.

Eupithecia, sp. (Geometridae), ‘when well-fed, live for three to four weeks in confinement; the males fertilize the females frequently, and the latter continue to lay eggs when they are very feeble, and are incapable of creeping or flying.’ Dr. Speyer.

The conclusions and speculations in the text seem to be sufficiently supported from this short series of observations. There remains, as we see, much to be done in this field, and it would well repay a lepidopterist to undertake some exact observations upon the length of life in different butterflies and moths, with reference to the conditions of life—the mode of egg-laying, the degeneracy of the wings, and of the external mouth-parts or the closure of the mouth itself. It would be well to ascertain whether such closure does really take place, as it undoubtedly does in certain plant-lice.

VII. Coleoptera

Melolontha vulgaris. Cockchafers, which I kept in an airy cage with fresh food and abundant moisture, did not in any case live longer than thirty-nine days. One female only, out of a total number of forty-nine, lived for this period; a second lived thirty-six days, a third thirty-five, and a fourth and fifth twenty-four days; all the rest died earlier. Of the males, only one lived as long as twenty-nine days. These periods are less by some days than the true maximum duration of life, for the beetles were captured in the field, and had lived for at least a day; but the difference cannot be great, when we remember that out of forty-nine beetles, only three females lived thirty-five to thirty-nine days, and only one male twenty-nine days. Those that died earlier had probably lived for some considerable time before being caught.

Exact experiments with pupae which have survived the winter would show whether the female really lives for ten days more than the male, or whether the results of my experiment were merely accidental. I may add that coitus frequently took place during the period of captivity. One pair, observed in this condition on the 17th, separated in the evening; they paired again on the morning of the 18th, and separated in the middle of the day. Coitus took place between another pair on the 22nd, and again on the 26th.

I watched the gradual approach of death in many individuals: some days before it ensued, the insects became sluggish, ceased to fly and to eat, and only crept a little way off when disturbed: they then fell to the ground and remained motionless, apparently dead, but moved their legs when irritated, and sometimes automatically. Death came on gradually and imperceptibly; from time to time there was a slow movement of the legs, and at last, after some hours, all signs of life ceased.

In one case only I found bacteria present in great numbers in the blood and tissues; in the other individuals which had recently died, the only noticeable change was the unusual dryness of the tissues.

Carabus auratus. An experiment with an individual, caught on May 27th, gave the length of life at fourteen days; this is probably below the average, since the beetles are found, in the wild state, from the end of May until the beginning of July.

Lucanus cervus. Captured individuals, kept in confinement, and fed on a solution of sugar, never lived longer than fourteen days, and as a rule not so long. The beetles appear in June and July, and certainly cannot live much over a month. As is the case with many beetles appearing during certain months, the length of the individual life is shorter than the period over which they are found. Accurate information, especially as to any difference between the lengths of life in the sexes, is not obtainable.

Isolated accounts of remarkably long lives among beetles are to be found scattered throughout the literature of the subject. Dr. Hagen, of Cambridge, Mass., has been kind enough to draw my attention to these, and to send me some observations of his own.

Cerambyx heros. One individual lived in confinement from August until the following year[14 - ‘Entomolog. Mag.,’ vol. i. p. 527, 1823.].

Saperda carcharias. An individual lived from the 5th of July until the 24th of July of the next year[15 - Ibid.].

Buprestis splendens. A living individual was removed from a desk which had stood in a London counting-house for thirty years; from the condition of the wood it was evident that the larva had been in it before the desk was made[16 - Ibid.].

Blaps mortisaga. One individual lived three months, and two others three years.

Blaps fatidica. One individual which was left in a box and forgotten, was found alive when the box was opened six years afterwards.

Blaps obtusa. One lived a year and a half in confinement.

Eleodes grandis and E. dentipes. Eight of these beetles from California were kept in confinement and without food for two years by Dr. Gissler, of Brooklyn; they were then sent to Dr. Hagen who kept them another year.

Goliathus cacicus. One individual lived in a hot-house for five months.

In addition to these cases, Dr. Hagen writes to me: ‘Among the beetles which live for more than a year,—Blaps, Pasimachus, (Carabidae)—and among ants, almost thirty per cent. are found with the cuticle worn out and cracked, and the powerful mandibles so greatly worn down that species were formerly founded upon this point. The mandibles are sometimes worn down to the hypodermis.’

From the data before me I am inclined to believe that in certain beetles the normal length of life extends over some years, and this is especially the case with the Blapidae. It seems probable that in these cases another factor is present,—a vita minima, or apparent death, a sinking of the vital processes to a minimum in consequence of starvation, which we might call the hunger sleep, after the analogy of winter sleep. The winter sleep is usually ascribed to cold alone, and some insects certainly become so torpid that they appear to be dead when the temperature is low. But cold does not affect all insects in this way. Among bees, for example, the activity of the insects diminishes to a marked extent at the beginning of winter, but if the temperature continues to fall, they become active again, run about, and as the bee-keepers say, ‘try to warm themselves by exercise’; by this means they keep some life in them. If the frost is very severe, they die. In the tropics the period of hibernation for many animals coincides with the time of maximum heat and drought. This shows that the organism can be brought into the condition of a vita minima in various ways, and it would not be at all remarkable if such a state were induced in certain insects by hunger. Exact experiments however are the only means by which such a suggestion can be tested, and I have already commenced a series of experiments. The fact that certain beetles live without food for many years (even six) can hardly be explained on any other supposition, for these insects consume a fair amount of food under normal conditions, and it is inconceivable that they could live for years without food, if the metabolism were carried on with its usual energy.

A very striking example, showing that longevity may be induced by the lengthening of the period of reproductive activity, is communicated to me by Dr. Adler in the following note: ‘Three years ago I accidentally noticed that ovoviviparous development takes place in Chrysomela varians,—a fact which I afterwards discovered had been already described by another entomologist.

‘The egg passes through all the developmental stages in the ovary; when these are completed the egg is laid, and a minute or two afterwards the larva breaks through the egg-shell. In each division of the ovary the eggs undergo development one at a time; it therefore follows that they are laid at considerable intervals, so that a long life becomes necessary in order to ensure the development of a sufficiently long series of eggs. Hence it comes about that the females live a full year. Among other species of Chrysomela two generations succeed each other in a year, and the duration of life in the individual varies from a few months to half a year.’

VIII. Hymenoptera

Cynipidae. I have been unable to find any accurate accounts of the duration of life in the imagos of saw-flies or ichneumons; but on the other hand I owe to the kindness of Dr. Adler, an excellent observer of the Cynipidae, the precise accounts of that family which are in my possession. I asked Dr. Adler the general question as to whether there was any variation in the duration of life among the Cynipidae corresponding to the conditions under which the deposition of eggs took place; whether those species which lay many eggs, or of which the oviposition is laborious and protracted, lived longer than those species which lay relatively few eggs, or easily and quickly find the suitable places in which to deposit them.

Dr. Adler fully confirmed my suppositions and supported them by the following statements:—

‘The summer generation of Neuroterus (Spathegaster) has the shortest life of all Cynipidae. Whether captured or reared from the galls I have only kept them alive on an average for three to four days. In this generation the work of oviposition requires the shortest time and the least expenditure of energy, for the eggs are simply laid on the surface of a leaf. The number of eggs in the ovary is also smaller than that of other species, averaging about 200. This form of Cynips can easily lay 100 eggs a day.

‘The summer generation of Dryophanta (Spathegaster Taschenbergi, verrucosus, etc.) lives somewhat longer; I have kept them in confinement for six to eight days. The oviposition requires a considerable expenditure of time and strength, for the ovipositor has to pierce the rather tough mid-rib or vein of a leaf. The number of eggs in the ovary averages 300 to 400.

‘The summer generation of Andricus, which belongs to the extensive genus Aphilotrix, have also a long life. I have kept the smaller Andricus (such as A. nudus, A. cirratus, A. noduli) alive for a week, and the larger (A. inflator, A. curvator, A. ramuli) for two weeks. The smaller species pierce the young buds when quite soft, but the larger ones bore through the fully grown buds protected by tough scales. The ovary of the former contains 400 to 500 eggs, that of the latter over 600.

‘The agamic winter generations live much longer. The species of Neuroterus have the shortest life; they live for two weeks at the outside; on the other hand, species of Aphilotrix live quite four weeks, and Dryophanta and Biorhiza even longer. I have kept Dryophanta scutellaris alive for three months. The number of eggs in these agamic Cynipidae is much larger: Dryophanta and Aphilotrix contain 1200 and Neuroterus about 1000.’

It is evidently, therefore, a general rule that the duration of life is directly proportional to the number of eggs and to the time and energy expended in oviposition. It must of course be understood that, here as in all other instances, these are not the only factors which determine the duration of life, but many other factors, at present unknown, may be in combination with them and assist in producing the result. For example, it is very probable that the time of year at which the imagos appear exerts some indirect influence. The long-lived Biorhiza emerges from the gall in the middle of winter, and at once begins to deposit eggs in the oak buds. Although the insect is not sensitive to low temperature, for I have myself seen oviposition proceeding when the thermometer stood at 5° R., yet very severe frost would certainly lead to interruption and would cause the insect to shelter itself among dead leaves on the ground. Such interruptions may be of long duration and frequently repeated, so that the remarkably long life of this species may perhaps be looked upon as an adaptation to its winter life.