292 



APPLIED ENTOMOLOGY 



succeed in reaching climates where they can successfully winter is perhaps 

 questionable, but if not, others at least, make their way North each 

 spring. 



This insect is practically free from attack by birds, probably because 

 it is able to produce a disagreeable odor. 



Family NymphalidaB. — This large family includes many familiar 

 forms, most of them large or of at least fair size. Their fore legs have 

 been reduced so much they they are no longer used but are carried 

 folded up against the thorax. 



Several of the common species in this group are found in Europe 

 as well as in this country and a few occur nearly everywhere in the 

 world where food and temperature permit their existence. The larvae 

 of some species feed on the currant, gooseberry and hop in the list of 

 cultivated plants, but are not often important pests. 



Fig. 311. — The Viceroy {Basilarchia archippus Cram.), natural size. (Original.) 



In one section of the family the insects are usually black with blue 

 or green, and occasionally red spots, and one or two species have a white 

 band across the wings. One of this group, however, differs greatly in 

 color from all the rest of its relatives, being reddish-brown with black- 

 lined veins, black wing borders enclosing white spots, and so closely 

 resembling the Monarch that it has been called the Viceroy (Fig. 311) 

 It differs from the Monarch, to the eye, however, by the presence of 

 a narrow black band across the hind wings and by its somewhat smaller 

 size. 



This radical departure in color and pattern of this insect from that 

 of all its near relatives is believed to be because this group is one freely 

 attacked by birds for food, while the Monarch, perhaps because of a 

 disagreeable odor, escapes. Any imitation which would deceive the 

 birds, would accordingly protect insects possessing it and enable them 



