Gary Maas, age 14, of Milwaukee, Wis., for his question:

WHAT ARE CARNIVORES AND HERBIVORES?

These fancy words refer to special diets of the animal world. The word carnivorous means devouring meat. Hence the carnivores are the meat eating cats and other animals that dine only on the meat of other animals. The herbivores are those that feed on leafy herbs and other plant foods. The deer, rabbits and other herbivores far outnumber the carnivores.

Some folk think of the carnivores as the mortal enemies of the herbivores. ,But nature has no such ideas. The peaceable plant eaters tend to multiply at a great rate and soon devour all the greenery. The carnivores help to keep down the herbivores' population explosions.  Otherwise they would run short of food. In the balance of nature, the meat eaters are needed to save the plant eaters from extinction.