53 



Mr. Williams had very kindly shared the resulting ova with him ; 

 both had bred a number of examples of this new aberration. He 

 found that about one-third of the resultant imagines were of this 

 new form and two-thirds of the typical smoked form. 



When obtaining four broods in 1917, probably as the result of a 

 warm summer, he found that the second brood examples were on the 

 average, slightly smaller than the captured (first brood) females ; 

 the third brood were, however, quite up to normal size, and the 

 fourth brood examples proved to be the largest. Neither third nor 

 fourth brood from the race produced the form coiiiina-nutnta. 



Owing to the succulent nature of the leaves, he found that the 

 larvre thrive best on sallow, but this is not obtainable after October 

 or November. This winter, he had hibernated the larvae on bramble, 

 giving them the young leaves as soon as they appeared in February, 

 and as a result, the imagines that are now emerging are very large 

 examples. Honeysuckle is also an excellent food plant as soon as 

 obtainable in the early spring. 



Mr. Hy. J. Turner contributed the following notes on l>>jsstro))ia 

 trnncata, Hufn. : — 



"This species and its variation is exhaustively dealt with by Mr. 

 L. B. Prout in the I'rans. (Jit!/ "f /^'■'"'/- i'^'it. Soc, p. 46, etc., 1901, 

 and p. 33, 1908, where he has unravelled all the early references 

 which may relate either to this species or to D. citrata [iuinianata), 

 with which it was confused until the middle of last century, when 

 Hellins, in 1861 and 1864, effectively separated them by breeding, 

 showing that D. tnincata was double-brooded, while Z). citrata was 

 single-brooded in nature. 



" Subsequent writers have shown the characters by which the 

 very similar imagines can be separated, of which the following is a 

 summary: — - 



" Cidaria [Di/sstroiiia) trnncata : Forewings broad, blunt, some- 

 what elongate; brown, grey-brown, or smoky-brown, sienna shades 

 black or weak: central band blacker, or browner, or ochreous, 

 or white with grey marking, outer edge jagged with long blunt 

 teeth. Hindwing.s darker, with an obscure, transverse, slender 

 central line, curved or bluntly and squarely angulated ; basal mark- 

 ings blurred ; subterminal line uninterrupted ; costal patch very 

 small ; discoidal spot large; midwing darker. 



" aidaria (Di/sstroiiia) citrata : Forewings pointed, rather ovate; 

 grey-brown or tawny-brown, sienna shades brighter ; central band 

 broad, black, pale ochreous, or white with fine dark lines, second 



