446 ENTOMOLOGICAL SOCIETY 



NOTES ON THE WINTER LEPIDOPTERA OF LAKE WORTH, 



FLORIDA. 



By HARRISON G. DYAR. 



The strip of land between Lake Worth and the Atlantic 

 Ocean, in Florida, was visited by me in January and February, 

 1890, and again in 1900. During this interval often years a rail 

 road has been built and two large hotels erected in what, at the 

 time of my first visit, was nearly primitive vegetation. The strip 

 of land is about half a mile wide in the central part in the 

 vicinity of Palm Beach, and is divided longitudinally by an area 

 of swampland into a " beach hammock " and " lake hammock." 

 The former extends the length of the lake, but the latter only for 

 the upper portion, disappearing below and ending in a chain of 

 small islands. This limited area has three different regions : (i) 

 the hammock land or forest, (2) the swamp, and (3) the beach 

 region. The forest covers the crests of the two ridges parallel to 

 the lake. The large trees are the mastic (Sideroxylon palliduni), 

 gumbo-limbo {Bursera gummiferd], palmetto (Sabal palmetto], 

 rubbber trees (JFicus aurea, pedunczilata, etc.), bay (Ncctandra 

 willdenoviand] and poison oak (Rhus metopium), with an 

 undergrowth of Foresticraporulosa, Randia aculeata, Ardisia 

 pickeringia, Condalia ferrea, Coccoloba floridana, Amy r is 

 floridana, etc., united by vines of Pisonia aculeata, Chiococca 

 racemosa, Ipomaea spp. etc., all forming a dense and tangled 

 mass of vegetation with no very large or tall trees. 



The swamp is mainly filled with saw-grass \Spartinajuncca) 

 and a few other marsh plants. In the dryer parts are bushes of 

 swamp cedar (Iva frutescens], and a few mangroves (Rhizo- 

 phora mangle) ; but these latter are commoner along the shore 

 of the lake where white mangrove \Laguncularia raccnwsa) 

 and Spanish oak ( Conocarpus erectd} also occur. 



The beach region varies in width in different parts. It ex 

 tends from the " beach hammock" to the sea. The dominant 

 plant is the saw palmetto (Screnoa serrulaia) with some bushes 

 of Myrica cerifcra, Coccoloba uvifera, Per sea carolincnsis, 

 and dwarfed specimens of various of the hammock plants. The 

 undergrowth is Echites umbellata, Crotalaria pumila, and 

 others. 



In all these regions the pine and live-oak, so conspicuous a 

 feature of Florida in general, are usually absent. They appear 

 in normal abundance, however, on the west shore of the lake, 

 entirely replacing the subtropical plants. 



The larger part of the original " lake hammock" has been de 

 stroyed to make room for houses, pastures and lawns, planted to 

 grass (Cenchrus spp.) and concomitant northern weeds, u beau 

 tified " by cocoanut trees, oleanders and Hibiscus bushes. The 



