18SI. 17 1 



between June 15th and July 10th, three of them fell to my lot, the 

 result of three mornings' work. The species seems to have been on 

 the wing for a long time, as I took a $ on May-day, and Mrs. Fletcher 

 a $ on July 12th in very fair condition. Several of the larvae were 

 taken in August and September off oak and beech. Amongst the 

 Nocture, I may mention the larvae of Oymatophora ridens as being 

 common on oak in June and July, of C. duplaris and Acronycta leporina 

 on alder and birch in August, of OrtJwsia lota on sallow in the spring, 

 t and of Erastria fuscula in September on the long grasses growing 

 i under the fir-trees in the enclosures. I believe that the larvae of 

 1 Hadena contigua were plentiful on Salix repens and Myrica gale 

 \ towards the end of the summer, but, unfortunately, I did not learn to 

 know this larva until they had nearly all pupated, when Miss Grolding- 

 i Bird kindly told me that the few remaining in my cage belonged to 

 this species. I must now end these already too lengthy notes with an 

 account of the unusual number of Acronycta alni, which have been 

 taken in the Forest this year. About the middle of June, Mr. G-eorge 

 I Tate took a female of this species at rest on an old hawthorn. On 

 |July 17th, Mrs. Fletcher took a larva in the "bird's dropping" stage, 

 land between this date and the end of the third week in August, one 

 hundred and ninety larvae were taken to my knowledge, thirty-six 

 having fallen to the lot of my wife and self. By far the greater number 

 of these were taken off alder, though several came off beech and oak, 

 a few off birch, and I saw Mr. Norgate take one off hawthorn. Un- 

 fortunately, the saying, "No rose without a thorn" holds good with 

 regard to these larvae, for they are infested with parasites. First of 

 all, there is a solitary grub which comes out of the larva when it would 

 sast off its "bird's-dropping " skin, and don its gorgeous livery, and 

 spins a piebald cocoon ; then there are, I think, two gregarious species 

 which, in parties of from four to twelve, crawl out of their victim 

 !when it should pupate and make dark-red cocoons ; these pests have 

 ilready reduced my stock to twenty, while my friends, Job's comforters 

 indeed, tell me that were I to open the sticks thought to contain pupae 

 |)f alni, I should find yet more blood-red cocoons, and also that there 

 s another species of parasite making its pupa within that of its victim. 

 Should, however, any of these destroyers prove to be of interest, I 

 hall hope to be able to hold them up to the execration of Lepidopterists 

 n the pages of a future number of the E. M. M. 



Bersted Lodge, Bognor, Sussex : 

 December 10tl, 1880. 



