•TflE VICTORIAN NATURALIST. Ill 



NOTES ON THE LARV^ AND PUP^ OF BIRCHIP 



HETEROCERA. 



Part IV. 



By D. Goudie. 



(Bead be/ore Field Naturalists' Club of Victoria, lOth October, 1904.) 



It is now over a year since the last of these life-histories appeared 

 in vol. xix. of the Victorian Naturalist. The severe drought of 

 1903 destroyed, for the time at least, all prospect of satisfactory 

 entomological work in this district. No doubt it was due to the 

 superabundance of " mallee rain," as the dust storms were called 

 locally. They made the opening of a store box an operation 

 fraught with peril for the contents, and had such a bad effect on 

 entomology all round that I forbore this work till a more favour- 

 able time. I am pleased to say that what has already been 

 published has proved interesting and useful to many, whose 

 inquiries have induced me to go on with the work. 



Thalaina angulosa, Walk. (Walker, Supp., p. 289 ; Meyrick, 

 Proc. Linn. Soc. N.S.W., 1891, p. 655; Lower, Vict. Nat., 

 xi., p. 80.) 

 I have taken the larvae of this fine geometer since 1898, but in 

 April, 1899, the moths were fairly numerous, and in August and 

 September of that year the larvae were everywhere, feeding on the 

 leaves of Acacia hakeoides and such shrubs. The moths were 

 quite common next April, and were followed by hundreds of 

 larvae again in the spring. They were almost blotted out of 

 existence, however, by the advent of a small black and yellow 

 banded fly, which deposited its eggs in the caterpillars, the 

 larvae eating their way out of their hosts as soon as the latter 

 entered the earth to pupate. I could not find a sign of moths or 

 larvae in 1902 and 1903, and only one this year so far. I have 

 observed a similar occurrence in the case of a butterfly (Delias 

 aganippe) and the previously described Capusa senilis. The 

 former was quite plentiful here once, feeding on the leaves of the 

 quandong, until the appearance of a parasite, which has apparently 

 killed it out altogether, as I have not seen either larvae or imago 

 here for years. 



The larvae of T. angulosa differ but slightly from those of the 

 other species of this genus. They are semi-loopers, and measure 

 when full fed about i ^ inches in length, and have at each side 

 of the head on the next segment a small projection or horn, 

 orange-red above and darker beneath. The head, which is invisible 

 from above, is emerald-green in colour. Dorsal area green, 

 thickly speckled with fine black spots. There is also a dark 

 bluish rather broad dorsal stripe. Lateral line yellow, interrupted 

 v/ith orange-red. Ventral surface pale bluish green, sometimes 

 with a few lighter longitudinal lines. Prolegs graduating to last 



