106 THE CANADIAN ENTOMOLOGIST. 



NOTES ON THE LIFE HISTORY OF ECPANTHERIA 



. SCRIBONIA, STOLL. 



BY HARRISON G. DYAR. 



The preparatory stages of this species do not seem to have been 

 described. Mr. Hy. Edwards in his catalogue gives eleven references, 

 but in none is the egg mentioned, or any but a single larval stage, and in 

 only one the pupa. It will, therefore, not be amiss to briefly describe 

 the several stages here. I would like first to call attention to the 

 remarkable fertility of the insect in question, at least in Southern Florida 

 where I met with it. In Psyche, Vol. III., p. 364, Mr. Krancher cites 

 an example of an European moth Lasiocampa quercifoUa, that laid 580 

 eggs, and seems to consider this an unusual number, as it doubtless is ; 

 but my example of Ecpantheria scribonia laid nearly four times as 

 many. 



The moth was bred from a larva found at Palm Beach on Lake 

 Worth, Florida, and emerged from pupa Feb. 4, 1890. As it was a 

 female and crippled, the wings having failed to develop properly, I tied it 

 out over night and the next morning found it mated with a male of the 

 variety demtdata, Slosson. On the evening of Feb. 6 it began to deposit 

 eggs on the sides of the box in which it was confined, and during the 

 night laid about 400 eggs. Every night after this it laid eggs till the 

 night lo-ii February, after which it died. The total number was 2,274 

 as nearly as I could count them. 



Egg: Nearly spherical, the base a little flattened, all minutely 

 punctured ; colour yellowish pearly gray ; diameter .8 mm. Duration of 

 this stage about five days. 



First stage : Head light brown, paler in front ; ocelli large, black ; 

 width .5 mm. Body pale whitish, except the first and central abdominal 

 segments (joints 5, 6, 9, 10 and 11) which are light brown. The warts 

 are arranged as usual in the Arctiidce* concolorous, the bristles black. 

 Length about .2 mm. Duration of the stage four days. 



Second stage : Head nearly colourless, shining, tinged with brown ; 

 ocelli large, black,; mouth parts brown; width .7 mm. Body nearly 

 concolorous with the head, not shining, tinged with reddish brown. The 

 warts of rows (i) and (2) (the trapezoidal warts) on joints 5, 6 and 9-1 1 



*As in Arctia, Leiicarctia, Spilosoma, Hypliantria, Arachnis, etc, but not as in 

 Halisidota. 



