SCIENTIFIC NOTES. ISS 



1897, I had a $ Phalcra bnn'/Jnila eiuersre. I took the full-fed larva 

 at Ramsgate on Sepfcembei' 17th, 1897, aud it pupated on September 

 20th, lb97.— Ihid. 



Selenia tetralunaria bred kkom Forres. — 1 have to-day (May 1st) 

 bred a rather light-coloured 2 of Selenia tetralniio )ia,h'om a larva taken 

 in the Altjre Woods, near Forres, on August 29th last. The larva in 

 question was beaten from larch, in company with such ordinary larch- 

 feeders as Macaria litnrata, Knpithecia lariciata, Gonodontis bidentata 

 and Ectroj'is [Tep/noaia) bUtortata, but it is just possible that it had 

 wandered or been blown from some neighbouring birch. Unfortunately 

 it did not occur to me at the time to try Avhether it would thrive on 

 larch ; I think it has never been recorded from this, though well- 

 known to be tolerably polyphagous on deciduous trees. What is the 

 distribution of this species in Scotland ? I believe in Dr. F. Buchanan 

 White's time the only Scottish record was for Rannoch, and Mr. 

 Barrett suggests {Brit. Lep., vii., p. 86) that oven this requires con- 

 firmation.-— Louis B. Prout. 



SCIENTIFIC NOTES AND OBSERVATIONS. 



The Winglessness of Winter Moths. — I was greatly interested 

 in Dr. Chapman's paper in your February issue on this subject, and 

 as I have as yet noticed no discussion on the theory he therein pro- 

 pounds, I venture to send you some remarks on a few points in 

 connection with it which have struck me. Of course I do not arrogate 

 to myself any scientific knowledge that will enable me to argue the 

 pros and cons with Dr. Chapman, and I have no theory of my own 

 with which to replace his, so i propose merely to adopt the very simple 

 role of fault-finder, and to lay stress on what appeal- to me, as a casual 

 observer, to be some of the weaker points in Dr. Chapman's argument. 

 Brieliy put, the theoi-y is that jUants have little or no scent in winter by 

 which to guide female moths to the correct foodplants for oviposition, 

 and that, consequently, wings (which would tempt those females from 

 the vicinity of the food on which, as larvae, they had been reared, and 

 near which they had eventually emerged) are dangerous, and have 

 gradually been lost, presumably by the survival only of those females 

 who did not use them, but remained instead close to the spot of 

 emergence. Now, of course, the more widely applicable any theory is, 

 the greater the probability of its correctness, and it is, consequently, a 

 weak point, that Dr. Chapman has to start by abandoning his theory of 

 foodplant scentlessness in the case of the Psychids, Orgyias, etc. 

 But, although also, Dr. Chapman adduces no evidence of this 

 alleged scentlessness in plants in winter, let us, for the moment, 

 assume its correctness, and then see whether it is sufficiently applicable 

 to those other species that have apterous females. There can be 

 no doubt that all larvcE have to face the danger of want of food- 

 plant or absence from it, either possibly by faulty oviposition on the 

 part of the parent, or from actual exhaustion of the food itself, or from 

 accidental removal therefrom of the larva itself, and nature meets 

 this difficulty, it seems to me, by, in nearly all cases, allowing the use 

 of substitute foods. If, then, those larv;e which feed on a single food- 

 plant had apterous female parents, or, if even the larv* of apterous 

 females fed on a single foodplant, Dr. Chapman's theory would be on 



