MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 301 



The first caterpillars began to spin their cocoons on the 9th of November 

 1917. The first batch of moths from these cocoons hatched on the night of 

 the 9th March 1918, These were four males. On the 13th some females 

 hatched and were set out on the night of the 14th. Males were caught on 

 them, and the females started to lay on the 15th. The caterpillars from these 

 began to hatch on the 25th March 1918. The first caterpillars from this 

 batch spun their cocoons on the 20th June 1918. The second batch of 

 moths from these turned on the 29th July 1918, and some females were set 

 out the same night and males taken. The moths laid on the 30th July 1918, 

 and the eggs hatched on the 9th August 1918. According to the time the 

 first batch took to spin their cocoons, i.e., two months. This batch should 

 begin to spin on the 7th October 1918. From this it will be seen that 

 there are three batches of cocoons in the year. The caterpillars are easy 

 to breed in captivity and copulate freely if kept loose in a room. In the 

 first batch raised, I had 150 eggs, out of which I got 142 cocoons. The 

 caterpillars were fed on oak leaves [Quercus seiniserrata). Till the second 

 mould had been taken, the caterpillars were kept in a cardboard box with a 

 tight fitting lid. After this they were put on to branches of the oak which 

 were stood up in a bottle with water in it. And this again was stood up 

 in a zinc bath tub to prevent any caterpillars falling oft', getting away and 

 being lost. 



The caterpillars are hardy and are easy to breed, and the silk appears 

 to be of good quality, and ought to be of commercial value if grown on a 

 large scale, but nobody in Burma seems to have the enterprise to do it. 



lam sending you under separate cover males and females of the Antherrea 

 roylei, also some empty cocoons of the same. Also a skin of the Wood 

 snipe, G. nemoricula, which was shot up here last March. 



C. W, ALLAN, 

 Deputy Conservator of Forests, 



Mandalay Division. 

 Maymyo, Burma, 

 lUh August 1918. 



No. XXIV.— A FLIGHT OF LOCUSTS. 



( With a Plate.) 



The accompanying photograph was taken by Lt.-Col. P. H. Rogers, 

 K.O.Y.L.I., in 1903, and represents the locusts crossing the compound of the 

 Club of Western India, Poona. If a magnifying glass is used the shape <»f 

 some of the locusts in the photograph can be plainly seen. 



E. C. B. AC WORTH. 

 Bombay, IWi December 1917. 



No. XXV.— NESTING HABITS OF VESPA DORYLLOIDES, Sauss. 



Specimens of a Wasp Vespa doi-ylloides, Sauss., and a dynastinid beetle 

 Blabephoiua pinguis,¥?Livu\., were recently sent me by Mr. A. J. S. Butter- 

 wick, Extra Assistant Conservator of Forests, Instructor, Burma Forest 

 School, with the following account of the conditions under which they were 

 taken : — 



" On the 22nd of last month (March 1918), 1 had occasion to burn out the 

 nest of a kind of yellow wasp (probably a species of Vesj)a), which had been 



