444 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1925 



Dr. Harry Eltringham believes that the sensation described by 

 Mr. Farquharson as " electric " is due to the capability of produc- 

 ing when handled extremely rapid muscular contractions or vibra- 

 tions by which the extremely rough cuticle of the caterpillar is made 

 to grate upon the skin. He noted a " shivering " at short intervals 

 in larvae of Theda pruni which in general appearance are not un- 

 like iliese larvae from tlie mistletoe. 



STINGING LYCACNID CATERPILLARS 



Dr. Harry Eltringham found that in the larvae of Teratoneura 

 hahelloe there are on segments 5 to 8, inclusive, dorso-laterally 

 placed dark patches which consist of masses of urticating spicules, 

 a most remarkable feature in a butterfly caterpillar. 



THE DISCOVERY OF CARNIVOROUS BUTTERFLIES 



The first butterfly actually known to be carnivorous was the 

 North American Feniseca tarquinius, originally described by Fabri- 

 cius in 1793. Mr. John Abbot, an p]nglishman who lived for a 

 number of years in Georgia, discovered the larva and pupa of this 

 species a few years after it was first described and drew most excel- 

 lent figures of them which are now in the British Museum. He said 

 that the caterpillar is " covered with a white loose down," which is 

 in reality the flocculent secretion of the aphids on which it feeds; 

 but he never suspected that the caterpillar of a butterfly could be 

 carnivorous. In various notes, published and unpublished, lie gave 

 a considerable list of supposed food plants. 



Following Abbot's observations previous to 1800, the next item of 

 interest was found by Mr. S. H. Scudder in the notebooks of Dr. 

 Asa Fitch after the latter's death. In an entry dated January 7, 

 1855, he wrote "I wholly forget the history of these specimens; I 

 find the pupa? slightly attached to the sides of a pill box, and the 

 butterflies hatched therefrom, and in the same box some beech 

 leaves and woolly plant lice {Schizoneura imhricator Fb.). I con- 

 jecture the worm from which the pupae came must have been feed- 

 ing among these lice, but have no recollection of the fact." The 

 butterflies were Feniseca tarquinius, and this was the first suspicion 

 of the occurrence of a carnivorous habit in a butterfl3\ 



As related by Mr. Scudder the earliest observation of the direct 

 association of the caterpillar of this species with the plant lice was 

 made by Misses Soule and Eliot late in July or early in August, 

 1880, when summering at Stowe, Vt. They brought into the house 

 a branch of alder white with aphids. "It was left in a corner for 

 a day or two, and meanwhile small, greenish caterpillars appeared 

 about the room, on the walls and bureau. They pupated on the 

 walls, the mop board, the pincushion, and tlie sides of the bureau. 



