Wonder Of Grasshoppers (1959)

[Music] [Music] all right jack go ahead all right you marking where he land draw us and I'll measure the distance about 5T that's a pretty good standing broad jump boy but you know if you'd been this little grasshopper you brought in you would have been able to jump almost 100 ft 100 ft how come because this 20 times its length now you said you were about 5T tall right well 5 * 20 = 100 100 fet now oh man that means you could jump the length of our football field in just three jumps right that's pretty fast figuring Ross she must be sharp at math 20 times his length how can I jump like that Uncle Bob well let's see if we can take a close look at these two hind legs of his I can get them out come on I'm not going to hurt you now okay there we are now then for it weight this muscle has the capacity to develop 10 times the power of the strongest man running at top speed no wonder we have such a hard time catching him yeah seems like we chased that thing for Miles well don't feel too bad fellas you're not the only one for thousands of years men all over the world have had a real fight to control these insects you see there's a very definite and delicate balance in nature and whenever we allow it to become unbalanced then there's trouble now if we don't control these grasshoppers properly they swarm all over the countryside eating everything in their path the financial loss amounts to millions of dollars as they destroy crops Gardens and our country in order to fight these plagues of Hoppers many different methods of control are used burning them out dusting the infested areas by airplanes and spraying chemicals on the crops mixing tons of poison which is spread on the crops by especially designed machines now all of this takes a lot of people a lot of time and costs millions of dollars boy there must be a lot of grasshoppers in this world there are a lot of them are all grasshoppers just alike well they are all quite similar come on to my lab and I'll show you some specimens I've collected oh wait a second better turn off this tube Checker I still haven't found the trouble with Harry Jackson's radio yet back up this way fellas there take a look at those wow look at those and I thought the one we caught was big yes this is the largest species of grasshopper and perhaps the most handsome of them all it's called the lber Grasshopper And even though this one has wings it can't fly because its body is too heavy you said grasshoppers were all alike they all look different to me well even though there are many differences in size and coloring among them all grasshoppers are basically alike you see the grasshopper is an insect and like all insects it has three distinct body parts the head the thorax and the abdomen it has three pair of legs and two sets of wings now grasshoppers wear their SC Skeleton on the outside instead of the inside because they don't have any bones inside their body like we humans have the grasshopper wears a very specially constructed suit of armor called an exoskeleton this special covering gives rigidity to the body and protects the soft inner parts these hard plates are much like the shell of a crab or Lobster and they are held together by flexible membranes that allow movement of the body and legs you really have has big eyes too hasn't he oh yes indeed and these are very special eyes that enable the hopper to see forward backward and sidewards but here on the tip end of the female's abdomen is one of the most perfectly designed little digging tools you'll find anywhere it's called an osit and is made up of four hard movable prongs which function like a miniature scoop shovel when the female is preparing to lay her eggs eggs you mean grasshoppers lay eggs just like birds do well well not quite like the birds do at least they don't have the same kind of Nest where do you suppose the mother grasshopper builds her nest um on one of the plants no you see the eggs have to be protected for seven or eight months before they hatch and if they were laid on a plant or on top of the ground they probably wouldn't last that long animals and birds in the weather might destroy the eggs long before they hatch so if you were a grasshopper and wanted to make sure that your eggs would be safe where would you put them I don't know I think I try and bury him right and that's just what Mrs grasshopper does she buries her eggs in the ground boy that would be a neat trick how dides she do it remember this little digging tool that I told you about the opositor with this she digs down into the ground making a tunnel in the earth usually she'll lay her eggs near a healthy plant so the babies will have some good food to eat when they emerge from the ground the following spring with her opositor operating like an automatic post hole digger she Burrows into the Earth stretching her abdomen to or three times its normal length as she forces it down into the tunnel now buried several inches into the dark rich soil the valves of the ovap posor open and the egg laying Begins the eggs which are about the size of large grains of rice are enveloped in a sticky substance and when all the eggs are laid they are covered with a final coat of this liquid glue which quickly hardens and binds the eggs together to protect them during their long stay in the soil when the female has finished laying her eggs she withdraws the osor leaving this mass of eggs each group holds from 25 to 60 eggs and the female will lay several such batches in a season still buried in the underground n the baby grasshopper which is called a nymph grows and develops inside the egg until the time comes when it finally breaks the eggshell however it is still wrapped in a cellophane like bag that holds the legs and feelers tightly against the body but despite this handicap through the soil and even if the egg pot has been covered with several inches of drifting dirt the nymph usually digs out all right immediately upon reaching the surface the young Hopper sheds the baby clothes that have hindered its movements but have protected its soft body during the struggle upward through the earth and the baby walk jump and eat once the trail has been broken by the first nymph the rest of them follow right along at first the nymph is fairly light in color but after several hours in the sunlight it turns rather black and has a definite yellow stripe down its back a newly hatched baby closely resembles its parents except except for its color and lack of wings the grasshopper's final suit of clothes is yellow with black markings and comes complete with wings what do you mean final sou clothes well as the hopper grows older it outgrows its clothes just like you fellas do you see there's a great difference in size between the baby and the adult grasshopper when it is first hatched the baby is less than half an inch long but when it is fully grown it may be over 4 in in length and it takes a heap of growing in just two short months to accomplish this and so the grasshopper goes through a series of changes by growing new body coverings and shedding the old ones this process is called molting and each time the grasshopper wriggles out of its old skin it emerges a little larger than before then because of a terrific appetite it stuffs itself with food and continues to grow very rapidly then during the warmth of early summer the time comes for the final mold everything is done as before only this time the results are different the hopper will rest up for a day before starting the mold then it will find a good sturdy place on the plant and secure its feet so it won't fall during the changing time when it is tightly fastened the grasshopper nymph will begin to squirm and jerk as it struggles to get out of the covering that has become too small sudden the skin splits open and the thorax and head start to emerge in a few minutes complete with eyes and feelers the head and thorax are free as the struggle continues the front pair of legs appear from inside the old covering and not only has its color changed but this time something new has been added for the first time delicate wings are attached to its back when the front two pair of legs are freed the grasshopper is hanging only by its hind legs and tail which are still in the Shell that's fastened to the plant finally the insect pulls its hind legs loose and scrambles madly for the branch as it jerks out its tail completely free from the old hollow shell that contained this beautiful insect just a couple of hours before then this fully grown grasshopper with its new buff yellow suit with interesting black marking and Red Wings will sit around for a couple of days waiting for the external parts of its body to harden so it can safely continue to carry on its own particular way of life yes with its marvelously made oap posor its shiny armor the tough protective exoskeleton powerful hind legs lovely Red Wings extraordinary eyes and sensitive antenna the lber grasshopper is truly a striking example of the great skill of the master designer you know I never thought about grasshoppers like that before they really are terrific little animals huh