156 THE entomologist's record. 



The late Mr. J. C. Dale's photograph appears in The British 

 Naturalist for the current month. 



Mr. Reid records the turning up of "several larvse of Hadena 

 porphyrea {satiira) on Bennachie, from which only one imago has, as 

 yet, been bred. Mr. Common (Connon?) of Braco captured a 

 beautiful specimen at treacle several years ago." 



" Sugar " appears to be maintaining its efficacy. Mr. Hodges reports 

 to us the capture of six Triphcena subsequa^X Freshwater. In Kent, on 

 Saturday night last (July 9th) a dozen patches were covered with moths ; 

 but they had to be left, all our boxes having been filled up previously. 



Students interested in the lepidoptera of Scotland, should not miss 

 Dr. Beveridge's article on " Lochinver as a locality for lepidoptera," in 

 the current number of the Annals of Scottish Natural History. 



The third volume of The British Noctuce and their Varieties has just 

 been published. Subscribers who have not yet received their vols, 

 should communicate at once with us. 



^OTES ON COLLECTING, Etc. 



A Red Letter Night on Wicken Fen. — Productive as is 

 " light " on Wicken Fen, the really good nights are if^' and far be- 

 tween. A close, warm night, cloudy, with thunder rumbling in the 

 distance, when you can stand still and perspire ! and the moths come 

 even too thick. All manner of flies and gnats buzz round your ears 

 and eyes, with Crambites and Pyrales. Nascia cilialis, among others, 

 dances up and down the lamp glass, attended by Chilo phragmitellus. 

 NocTU^ keep dabbing on the " sheet," caia comes flopping around, 

 generally in your face, assisting the swarms of gnats and common 

 things to prevent your boxing a Catoptria expallidana which is running 

 up and down the lamp glass. "Lappets" and "Drinkers" come flop 

 on the sheet, and some of them dropping off keep up an incessant 

 rustle in the grass below, while Botiibyx neustria and Arctia fieligitiosa, 

 the noisiest of all, come tap, tap against the lamp, and then com- 

 mence a series of furious charges, making it a matter of impossibility 

 to box the rare micros that run up and down the front of the 

 lamp. The only way is to go for these noisy, blustering fellows 

 — catch, kill, knock them down, tread on them — anything for a 

 lull in the wild storm, and you may go the next morning 

 and survey the wreck — " Tigers," "Lappets," " Drinkers," " Lackeys," 

 wings and bodies all over the place. August is the month for these 

 night of nights ; July stands next chance ; June rarely produces one ; 

 this, however, is the month for quality of species. Such a night in 

 May is as unlikely as " snow in harvest." But I was on the Fen on 

 Tuesday, May 31st, and saw Houghton, who told me of a wonderful 

 night he had on May 27th. Species, usually looked for three weeks 

 later, out in profusion, such as Arctia fidiginosa, Vitninia venosa, 

 Meliana flammea, Nascia cilialis, etc., and his characteristic statement 

 that there were " hundreds and thousands," was proved afterwards, 

 when I called at his house, by the board after board he showed me 

 filled with the above-mentioned species, some of the finest tlammea I 

 have ever seen, and a grand lot of pretty forms of fuliginosa ; and the 



