4i6 



The Moths and Butterflies 



twig of an apple or wild-cherry tree; the eggs do not hatch until the follow- 

 ing spring, when the young larvae feed on the buds and young leaves of the 

 tree. The social larvae build a little web or nest in the fork of a branch, 



going out of it only to feed. As the 

 caterpillars grow they enlarge the web 

 until it becomes a bulky ugly affair 

 perhaps two feet long, partly filled with 

 excrement and cast skins. The full- 

 grown caterpillars are blackish with 

 yellow and bluish spots, white striped 

 along the back, and covered with fine 

 yellowish hairs. "They feed on the 

 young and tender leaves, and eating 

 on an average two leaves a day the 

 young of one pair of moths consume 

 from ten to twelve hundred leaves, and 

 FIG. 597. Venation of Halesidota tessel- as it is not uncommon to find from six 

 lata. cs, costal vein; sc, subcostal to eight nests on a single tree not less 

 vein: r, radial vein; m, medial vein; ,, ,- ., , , 



c, cubital vein; a, anal veins. (After than seventy-five thousand leaves are 

 Comstock; enlarged.) devoured, a loss which no tree can long 



endure." In about forty days the larvae 



are ready to pupate, when they scatter from the nest, find sheltered places 

 under eaves, fence-rails, etc., and spin spindle-shaped cocoons of white, 

 almost transparent silk, within which they change. After twenty to twenty- 

 five days of pupal life the winged moths issue and soon after lay their 

 eggs for next year's brood. The life-history of the various other species 

 is similar to this although other trees are chosen for feeding-grounds. 



The lappet-moths, so-called from the curious lobes or lappets arranged 

 along the sides of their caterpillars, are of several species. Tolype velleda, 

 expanding i^ to if inches, has a white body with a black spot and dusky- 

 gray wings crossed by white lines; its caterpillar feeds on the foliage of 

 apple-, cherry-, and plum-trees, and is hair-fringed and protectively colored so 

 that it looks much like an excrescence of the bark on which it habitually 

 lies when not feeding. Gastropacha americana (Fig. 601), the American 

 lappet-moth, expanding ij inches, is so like a dead leaf in appearance that 

 it can hardly be distinguished when at rest; it varies somewhat in color, 

 but most individuals are reddish brown with a broad interrupted whitish 

 band across both wings; the hinder and outer edges of the fore wings and 

 the outer edges of the hind wings are deeply notched. The caterpillar feeds 

 on apple, cherry, and oak, hiding during the day but becoming active at 

 night. It is broad, convex above and flat beneath, ash-gray with fringes 

 of blackish or gray hairs, and when at rest it is almost impossible to recognize. 



