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Updated: August 15, 2024
The larva when full-grown is about two inches long, and is quite the most rapacious creature which lives in our waters. The adult beetle is also purely carnivorous, but is perhaps not quite so rapacious. It would, however, probably attack a larger fish. The largest of English water beetles is Hydrophilus piceus.
The claws, with which Hydrophilus seizes its prey, are, too, considerably smaller than those of Dytiscus. This larva should be kept out of the rearing ponds with just as much care as that of the more voracious D. marginalis. With the kingfisher I have already dealt at some length, so that I need say but little more with regard to it.
Not only were those familiars there, but they were represented by species belonging to the typical genera Gyrinus, Colymbetes, and Hydrophilus. Over these pools flew dragon-flies, whose larval stages are passed in the water, closely resembling others all over the world. All the land fauna was strikingly different from that of other regions; but the water fauna was as strikingly similar.
Uric acid, the inevitable product of the vital transformations, or at all events one of its analogues, must be formed in both. But the Hydrophilus' larva shows no accumulation of it in its adipose layer, whereas the Sphex' is full of it.
I have observed them in many other insects, either in the larval or in the perfect state; but in this respect there is none to equal the grub of the game-hunting Wasp, which is all speckled with white. I think I see the reason. Let us consider two larvæ which eat live prey: that of the Sphex and that of the Hydrophilus.
The gentle Kangaroo was also deeply moved, seeing the Platypus in such sorrow, and Dot mastered her aversion to touching cold, damp fur, and stroked the little creature's head. The Platypus seemed much soothed by their sympathy, but hurriedly bid them farewell. It said it must try and restore its shattered fifth pair of nerves by a few hydrophilus latipalpus beetles for lunch, and a sleep.
In the larva of the Hydrophilus, on the other hand, the excretions enjoy a free outlet from the beginning; and the urinary products escape as and when formed and are no longer deposited in the adipose tissue. But during the intense labour of the metamorphosis, any excretion becomes impossible; the uric acid must and does collect in the adipose substance of the different larvæ.
I also frequently observed in the lagoon near the Botanic Garden, where the water is only a little less salt than in the sea, a species of hydrophilus, very similar to a water-beetle common in the ditches of England: in the same lake the only shell belonged to a genus generally found in estuaries. Leaving the coast for a time, we again entered the forest.
The gentle Kangaroo was also deeply moved, seeing the Platypus in such sorrow, and Dot mastered her aversion to touching cold, damp fur, and stroked the little creature's head. The Platypus seemed much soothed by their sympathy, but hurriedly bade them farewell. It said it must try and restore its shattered fifth pair of nerves by a few hydrophilus latipalpus beetles for lunch, and a sleep.
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