LEPIDOPTERA. 343 



7US*). The first two attack both the roots and knaves of winter 

 wheat; the second also destroys buckwheat; and it is stated 

 that sixty bushels of mould, taken from a field where they 

 prevailed, contained twenty-three bushels of the cateri)illars ; 

 those of the eagle-moth occasionally prove very destructive in 

 vineyards ; and the caterpillars of the antler-moth are notorious 

 for their devastations in meadows, and particularly in moun- 

 tain pastures. 



The habits of our cut-worms appear to be exactly the same 

 as those of the European Agrotidians. It is chiefly during 

 the months of June and July that they are found to be most 

 destructive. Whole corn-fields are sometimes laid waste by 

 them. Cabbage-plants, till they are grown to a considerable 

 size, are very apt to be cut off and destroyed by them. Potato- 

 vines, beans, beets, and various other culinary plants suffer in 

 the same way. The products of our flower-gardens are not 

 spared ; asters, balsams, pinks, and many other kinds of flowers 

 are often shorn of their leaves and of their central buds, by 

 these concealed spoilers. Several years ago I procured a con- 

 siderable number of cut-worms in the months of June and 

 July, Some of them were dug up among cabbage-plants, 

 some from potato-hills, and others from the corn-field and the 

 flower-garden. Though varying in length from one inch and 

 a quarter to two inches, they were fully grown, and buried 

 themselves immediately in the earth with which they were 

 supplied. They were all thick, greasy-looking caterpillars, of 

 a dark ashen gray color, with a brown head, a blackish horny 

 spot on the top of the first and last rings, a pale stripe along 

 the back, and several minute black dots on each ring. They 

 were soon changed to chrysalids, of a shining mahogany-brown 

 color; and between the twentieth of July and the fifteenth of 

 August they came out of the ground in the moth state. Much 

 to my surprise, however, these cut-worms produced five differ- 

 ent species of moths ; and, when it was too late, I regretted 

 that they had not been more carefully examined, and compared 

 together before their transformation. 



* See "Kollar's Treatise," pp. 94, 102, 1G6, and 13G. 



