REARING CATERPILLARS. 247 



Indeed, the electric lights now make the best collecting 

 places, and they attract moths and beetles to such an ex- 

 tent that almost nothing can be taken at sugar or gas- 

 lamps where these lights are situated. A light trap may 

 be made by a lantern combined with a reflector, suspended 

 out of doors ; under the lantern a funnel several inches 

 larger than the lantern may reach down into a box or bottle 

 containing the fumes of chloroform or ether, or benzine, 

 or, if the lantern is used for beetles, into a bottle filled with 

 dilute alcohol. 



It should be borne in mind, as Mr. Thaxter observes, 

 that Noctuids always fly against the wind, and unless the 

 light is so placed that they can fly thus to get to it, one's 

 success will be slight. 



We will now describe the methods of rearing and pre- 

 serving insects of different orders. 



REARING CATERPILLARS. 



The best specimens of moths and butterflies are obtained 

 by rearing them from the egg, or from the larva or pupa. 

 Besides merely breeding caterpillars in order to procure 

 good specimens for the cabinet, the modern student of 

 entomology who desires to trace the genealogy of Lepidop- 

 tera should study the freshly-hatched larva, and compare it 

 and the other early stages with the full-grown larva, so as 

 to obtain a complete life-history, with colored illustrations, 

 of each stage. Hence a good deal of care must be exercised 

 in breeding and describing caterpillars. In confinement 

 the food should be kept fresh, and the breeding cage or box 

 well ventilated. Tumblers covered with gauze, pasteboard 

 boxes pierced with holes and fitted with glass in the covers, 

 or large glass jars but better still, tin boxes of different 

 sizes, in which the food remains fresh for several days are 

 very convenient to use as cages. The bottom of such ves- 

 sels may be covered with moist sand, in which the food- 



