THE ENTOMOLOGIST 



Vol. XLIV.] DEOEMBEE, 1911. [No. 583 



LIFE-HISTORY OF ANOSIA PLEXIPPUS. 

 By F. W. Frohawk, M.B.O.U., F.E.S. 



My success attained in working out the complete life-history 

 of Anosia jjlexippus is entirely due to the kind and untiring 

 assistance of the Hon. N. Charles Eothschild, also Dr. A. Skinner, 

 of Philadelphia, and Mr. J. H. Gerould, of Hanover, N.H. To 

 these three gentlemen I offer my sincere thanks. 



After repeated failures in attempts made in sending living 

 females of this fine butterfly across the Atlantic, I at last received 

 from Mr. Gerould two females alive, which arrived at 9 a.m., 

 August 8th last. I immediately opened the package, when they 

 at once crawled out with protruding tongues probing about for 

 moisture, whereupon I dipped my finger into sugar and water, 

 upon which one clung for an hour, drinking the whole time. After 

 such a long drink without moving I took it off, but it evidently 

 would have continued its feast longer had I spared it the time. 

 The other also greedily fed on the liquid. 



I then placed them both on the only growing plant of 

 Asclepias corimti (milk weed) which survived the hot summer 

 weather, and stood them in the sun, it being a hot cloudless day 

 with a shade temperature of 80° at 11 a.m. By 2 p.m. I 

 found seven eggs were laid, five on the upper and two on the 

 under surfaces of the leaves. Many more eggs were deposited 

 at intervals during the following fortnight, but all those laid 

 by the most perfect specimen proved to be infertile. 



The first egg laid at noon, August 8th, hatched at 5.30 a.m., 

 August 12th, remaining only three and three-quarter days (about 

 ninety hours) in the egg state. 



It is owing to the very short period of time occupied by the 

 egg that I failed in completing the life-history last year, when 

 Dr. Skinner very kindly sent me a supply of larva) in different 

 stages, together with a few eggs. These were dispatched from 

 Philadelphia on May 31st, 1910, and reached me on June 7th, 

 consequently by this lapse of time the eggs had hatched and I 

 found a few small larvie just previous to the first moult. One of 



ENTOM. — DECEMBER, 1911. 2 F 



