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Rural School Leaflet 



it is fully grown, it is a beautiful pca-grecn creature ornanieutcd with 

 tubercles that vary from red to rose color and yellow, those on the abdom- 

 inal segments sometimes being blue. There is a strong likeness between 

 the caterpillar of the luna and that of the polyphemus, and it takes an 

 expert to tell them apart when they are fully grown. 



When the caterpillar gets ready to spin its cocoon, it draws two leaves 

 closely around itself and weaves a cocoon within them. In the winter 

 it usually falls with the leaves to the ground; there it remains safe and 

 sound until the springtime comes, and the moth within it bursts the pupa 

 skin and pushes its way out into the world. 



Luna moth 



Editors* note. — The editors are sometimes asked by teachers and children 

 who have found what to them is a strange insect, whether it may be dis- 

 posed of at a profit. The large biological supply houses have their own 

 corps of collectors in the field, and there is little opportunity for an 

 amateur collector to sell specimens. Moreover, it is only the more com- 

 mon forms that the inexperienced collector usually takes, and even then 

 he is often likely to preserve them in such fonn that they are unaccept- 

 able to a supply company. It is a difficult field to enter successfully. 



