cukeeNt notes. 137 



URRENT NOTES. 



The sale of Mr. J. Trimmer Williams' collection, on Jime 16th, 

 was not at all satisfactory. The insects were in good condition, but 

 unlabelled, and in the middle of June entomologists evidently prefer 

 fields to the sale-room. 



Larvte of a Culeophora Avere found on Vacciniiim vitis-idaea, at 

 Rannoch, by Mr. W. Salvage, in the springs of 1884, 1891, 1893, and 

 again this year, 1896. From these Mr. W. H. B. Fletcher bred 

 imagines which were identified as C. t/litzeUa, Hfmn., by comparison 

 with specimens in the " Stainton " collection. Mr. Bankes has now 

 compared larval cases and imagines with Dr. Hofmann's original 

 description (Stett. Ent. Zcit., 1869, pp. 119-122), as well as with the 

 insects and cases in the " Frey," " Zeller " and " Stainton " collections, 

 and gives a description {E.M.M.) of the imago, larva, case and pupa of the 

 Scotch insects. It appears that Scotch specimens " differ somewhat 

 from Continental ones," and Mr. Bankes gives us as points of 

 difference that (1) " Scotch specimens seem, as a rule, to run decidedly 

 darker than those from the Continent;" (2) " The larvae of Scotch 

 specimens are redder than those of German ones, the full-fed larvtT3 of 

 the latter being of a beautiful bright yellow. The fore-wings of the imago 

 are glossy, unicolorous, varying in colour in different individuals, from 

 rather dark grey to pale greyish ochreous. E.rp. al., 12-14mm. Hind- 

 wings glossy, dark grey to very pale grey ; cilia, pale grey to greyish- 

 ochreous." The females average smaller, and are less grey and more 

 strongly ochreous than the males. The case is nearly straight, 

 irregularly cylindrical-oval, 7-8 mm. long, formed of cut pieces of leaf, 

 smooth and somewhat polished, and varying in colour from very dark 

 to bright pale brown. It has a distinct keel along each side, 

 and its general shape is likened to a young pea-pod. The young larva 

 is said to mine a leaf of its food-plant in June, and hybernates in its 

 mine, quits the latter in early spring, makes a case, feeds a little while, 

 festivates, and then hybernates until the next spring, when it feeds up 

 rapidly, mining a broad gallery in the leaf, following the margin, and, 

 on leaving the leaf, makes a new case, in which it travels to a fresh 

 leaf. It spins up for pupation at the end of April, and the moth 

 emerges about the middle of May, on the Continent, but a month 

 later, middle of June, in Scotland. Dr. Chapman states that the way 

 in which the first pair of legs covers a portion of the maxilUe, and 

 also of the second pair, is peculiar. Mr. Bankes, in his description, 

 counts the head of the larva as the " first " segment ! ! 



Mr. R. McLachlan (E.M.M.) has suggested that the peculiar spine 

 or tooth found on the 4th segment of the male of Panarpa, and usually 

 concealed under a bristly flap or projection of the middle of the apical 

 margin of the 3rd segment, is stridulatory. Dr. Felt {Tenth Report of 

 the New York State Eutom., 1896) inclines to the opinion that the 

 structure is glandular, and secretes a volatile oil, attractive to the 

 female. 



Mr. J. J. F. X. King captured a pair of A(iri/pnia jiicta, Kol., last 

 year, in Unst. This species had hitherto been known as British, from 

 a specimen taken on a gas-lamp, near London, by Mr. Pryer. 



Mr. H. Slater, of Wansford, Northants, records the capture, on 

 June 1st, of a specimen of Ino statices, which has " a normal male- 



