198 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN. 



week in the early part of April, spent at Hesperia, Cali- 

 fornia, where brevifolia is very abundant, I was fortunate 

 enough to observe many of the moths at work in somewhat 

 more open flowers, where their operations could be observed 

 in detail by the use of a bull's-eye lantern, to which they 

 show about the same tolerance as the other species. 



When about to deposit an egg, having selected a suitable 

 flower, the female of synthetica runs to the bottom of the 

 stamens much as yuccasella does, makes a rapid more or 

 less complete circuit of their bases, and then quickly as- 

 cends to the very top of the pistil, her thorax rather 

 higher than the end of the stigma, and with her short but 

 ■strong ovipositor cuts through the thin wall, into the stylar 

 channel, rarely as much as 2 mm. below the tip of the 

 stigma, meantime holding fast to the pistil, the stamens 

 being below her reach. The long extensile oviduct is then 

 passed through the puncture, the egg being laid apparently 

 within the ovarian cell, along the funicular end of the 

 ovules. In removing the oviduct the moth not infrequently 

 carries her body across the stigma, so that at first sight she 

 appears to be withdrawing it directly from the mouth of 

 the stylar canal ; but I have never seen her make direct use 

 of this canal. The operation consumes more time than 

 does the oviposition of either yuccasella or maculata as I 

 have observed them, and usually takes altogether from two- 

 and-a-half to three minutes. Sometimes two or more eg"s 

 are laid before the stigma is pollinated, but commonly after 

 laying each egg the moth retreats to the bottom of the 

 flower and then again ascends the pistil until her head is 

 brought even with the stigma, when she uncoils the large 

 tentacles from their resting-place against her load of pollen 

 and passes them back and forth in the stigmatic chamber, 

 with almost the same motion as the eastern species, usually 

 making use of one of the stigmatic notches. While so 

 employed she carries the rather short tongue almost straight 

 out above the stigma, but I have never seen her make any 

 use of it to force pollen into the latter, nor has she been 



