PLUME-MOTHS OF CEYLON. 13 



are a little longer than the diameter of the segments on which they 

 arise. The legs are yellowish-green, extremities of claws reddish. 

 Prolegs very transparent pale green, hooks reddish. Spiracles very 

 inconspicuous. Secondary hairs short, black. (Plate E, figure 4.) 



Parasites. — Of some fifty or sixty larvae collected, about 75 per 

 cent, were found to be attacked by a small black ichneumonid fly. 



Pupa. — The pupa is suspended freely by the tail from an empty 

 flower-sheath of the food plant. It is rather short, the appendage 

 sheaths very long and well separated. Colour a pale flesh-pink, 

 mottled longitudinally with brown ; head and wing-sheaths pale 

 greenish, the latter with longitudinal brown shading. Dorsal 

 prominences small, distinct, subequal, directed forward, except the 

 first, which is extremely large, directed backwards, blunt, but 

 tipped anteriorly with a sharp spine whose point is bent forward. 

 This large prominence is sharply outlined by a deep brown shading 

 which reaches obliquely anteriorly half way across the wing-cover. 

 A second brown shade, parallel to the first but less intense and 

 narrower, occurs on the 6th segment, but barely reaches on to the 

 wing-sheath. 



Imago. — The moth emerges from the pupa after about a week. 



Platyptilia pusillidactyla, Wlk. 

 (Plate A., figure 2.) 



Pusillidactyla.— Wlk., Cat. XXX., 933; Wlsm., P. Z. S., 1891, 

 495 ; 1. c, 1897, 57 ; Meyr., T. E. S., 1907, 483. 



Tecnidion.— Zeller, Hor. Soc. Ent. Ross., XIII., 468 (1877). 



Hemimetra.— Meyr., T. E. S., 1886, 18 ; B. J., XVII., 135. 



Distribution. — Anuradhapura, Kurunegala, Kegalla, Galle, Weli- 

 gama, Trincomalee, Puttalam, Colombo, Matale, Maturata, Kandy, 

 Peradeniya, Maskeliya, Diyatalawa, Bandarawela, Passara, Madul- 

 sima, Badulla, Haldummulla. 



Abundant throughout Ceylon in every district that has been 

 invaded by Lantana. 



Early Stages. — Ovum. — TlWegg is about • 4 mm. long by about ■ 22 

 mm. broad, and is of a very pale greenish-yellow colour (almost 

 colourless) ; one end seems larger than the other and this larger 

 end is studded with little prominences, especially noticeable in the 

 micropylar area. 



Oviposition.—On the evening of January 4, 1908, I watched a 

 female ovipositing on Lantana at Galle. She flew about slowly and 

 pitched on a terminal shoot enclosing a small green unexpanded 

 flower bud. This she seemed to examine by bending down her head 

 and antennae and then, apparently satisfied, she bent her abdomen 

 downwards and right forward (until the ovipositor must have 

 extended at least as far forward as her head) and deposited a single, 

 small, oval, greenish- white ovum. She then flew to another bud 



