14k Canadian Arctic Expedition, 1913-18 
The first butterflies of the season appear at this time (Brenthis frigga 
alaskensis and B.f.improba). The smaller form (improba) has a fluttering 
flight and settle on plants with the wings spread out, moving them up and down 
in the manner characteristic of this genus. Though seen on swampy ground, 
it seems to favour the drier brown-coloured tundra and the bluffs with their 
richer growth of flowers. The larger form {B.f. alaskensis) is found in similar 
places, but has a wilder flight and remains longer on the wing. The colias 
butterflies (Colias hecla glacialis) appear about the same time, but as noted bj^ 
D. Jenness on Barter island, the hrenthis species are slower, more zigzagging 
in their flight, and do not appear to travel such long distances at a stretch. 
Lepidopterous larvae, 5 mm. long, yellow-green, but head and thoracic legs 
brown, skeletonize the leaves of Salix reticulata and spin them together with the 
catkins, thus deforming both. Full-grown, black, flat hemiptera (Chiloxanthes 
stellatus) are seen in the dried-out ponds, but appear not to use their wings and 
to avoid water. Around those ponds with a rich vegetation washed-up plants 
and shells of a snail (Aplexa hynorum) are common. 
July 11-21 
Additional insects observed: 
Bumblebees Bomius hirbyellus 
Butterflies Bi^ciithis chariclea 
Colias nastes 
Moths Pyla arctiella 
Barrovia fasciata 
Scattered driftwood affords good colour protection to certain flies and 
microlepidoptera. 
The ponds, many dry or nearly so, contain the usual life of snails, mites, 
copepods, metanauplii of Branchinecta paludosa, worms, dytiscid beetles, etc. 
A few predacious larvae of water-beetles, their discarded sldns floating on the 
surface, feed on the abundant young phyllopods. Three common species of 
Salix — S. pulchra, S. richardsonii, S. ovalijolia var. camdensis — -have finished 
flowering, but a fourth, S. reticulata, lasts a little longer. The male catkins 
drop off, but the females remain until the seedwool comes out, or perhaps 
throughout the winter. Those insects (principally Bonibi) depending upon the 
male catkins, must therefore, be satisfied with other flowers, but the sawfly 
larvae (different species) boring in the carpels of the female catkins or forming 
galls on the willow leaves are not so affected. 
July 22-31 
Toward the end of July, a number of other plants {Papaver nudicaule, 
Cochlearia officinalis, Oxytropis sp., Saxifraga oppositi folia, Potentilla sp., etc.) 
have finished flowering or nearly so, so that the insects must seek other flowers. 
On Herschel island the following were noted in addition to the common 
insects : — 
Flies : • 
Rhampliomyin herschelli Sphacrophoria cylindrica 
R. conservativa Ichneumon ids (Stenomacrus borealis) 
Mclnnostoma sp. (Spiders) Pardosa groenlandica 
Phorhia sp. (Mites) Bdella frigida 
Limnophora sp. 
In Ponds and Lakes 
(Mites) Lcemnipes torris Cladocera (Daphnia, etc.) 
Copepods (Heterocope. etc.) Larvae of Chironomus and Tanypus 
Amphipods {Gammarus limnaeus) (Midges) 
On the leaves of the various species of Salix are seen galls caused by sawfly 
larvae {Pontania sp.) Other sawfly larvae bore in the female catkins of these 
willows; the larvae cat their way into the carpels and from these into the main 
axis of the catkin, which they hollow out. Their presence is detected by the 
dried-out character of the catkin and by the brown excrement outside. 
