OBSERVED IX nEllTFORDSnillE IX 1893. 79 



HATVK-MOTHS. 



T liavo pleasure in recording the capture in St. Albans of two 

 full-grown larva^ of the death's-head moth {Acherontia atrajmn). 

 On July 12th Mrs. Ashdown kindly sent me a larva which had 

 been found in the grounds of Mr. A. Mellwraith, at Campbellfield. 

 It was a well-marked dark vaiiety, and went to earth almost 

 immediately. At about the same date one of Mr. Arthur Lewis's 

 gardeners rescued another caterpillar of this moth from the tender 

 mercies of a small boy. It was crawling across the road in Grange 

 Street, St. Albans, evidently seeking a convenient spot for pupa- 

 tion, when it attracted the attention of an urchin, who was on 

 the point of smashing it with a large stone. Both these specimens 

 went through the pupa state successfully, and the perfect insects 

 emerged at the end of September or the beginning of October, 

 but as I was from home I cannot give the exact dates. 



Mr. Latchmore sends me an interesting note about the death's- 

 head moth. He tells me that an old Bedfordshire farmer has been 

 interested in his men finding a lot of the larvae in potato-digging. 

 " He put a number in a pot and placed them in his garden, 

 thinking to hatch them naturally, as he said. One of his men 

 put seven or eight into a jar filled with earth, and the result 

 was that the farmer's, which were out of doors, were all mouldy 

 and dead in the spring, whilst the labourer's, which were in 

 the warm chimney corner, all came out and flew about the 

 cottage.'' Mr. Latchmore says that no specimens of either this 

 moth or Sphinx cotivolvuli were taken last year at Hitchin, though 

 nearly all the hawk-moths noticed last season have been equally 

 common again. 



]\[iss Ormerod informs me that a full-grown larva of the eyed 

 hawk -moth {Smerinthus ocellatus) was found at Torrington House, 

 St. Albans, about the middle of August. Mr. Arthur Lewis has 

 in his collection an interesting moth which appears to be a hybrid 

 between the poplar hawk-moth [S. populi) and the eyed hawk- 

 moth (<S. ocellatus). Mr. Cutts took the larvae of the latter moth 

 off his apple-trees again last year, and those of S. populi at the 

 end of Mascot Wood lload. Mr. Charles Rothschild figures and 

 describes a veiy curious abeiTant form of the lime hawk-moth 

 (S. tilice) in the 'Entomologist' for February. 



Mr. C. F. Pilbrow, of Colney Heath, reports that the larvte 

 of the elephant hawk-moth [Choerocampa elpmor) were very scarce. 

 He only took five, all being, strange to say, green. In other years 

 he has taken dozens, but had only found about two per cent, green. 

 Mr. Pilbrow had formed the theory that the unusually blight 

 weather had affected the colour, but this was upset by finding 

 another batch in Hampshire, all of which were veiy dark. They 

 were full fed quite a month earlier than usual. Of the five 

 green specimens four were perceptibly "stung," and Mr. Pilbrow 

 suggests that this may possibly affect the colour. These larvae 

 are to be looked for along the streams, feeding on water-betony and 



