• — 2og — 



Preparatory stages of Heterocampa subrotata Harvey. 



BY HARRISON G. DYAR. 



The eggs were not observed, but I believe I have found the 

 lar\a in its first stage, which is as follows: 



First Stage. — Head depressed at the vertex, dark wine-red. 

 Width .6 mm. Body cylindrical, smooth and shining, but annulated 

 anteriorly. Feet normal, the anal pair elevated and rather long, the 

 claspers apparently aborted, or perhaps withdrawn in the ends of 

 the legs as in the mature larva. Cervical shield large, bearing a pair 

 of horns like anders, three branched, the branches curved and di- 

 verging, with a shorter spur near the base of the horn, all dark 

 blackish brown. On joints 5-10, 12 and 13, from elevated shining 

 bases grow a pair of similar, but more slender horns, not branched, 

 but knobbed a little beyond the middle and bent, knobbed again at 

 the end and terminating in a hair; those on the last segments are 

 rather shorter, and all, with the anal feet, are dark blackish brown. 

 Body dark wine-red, finely streaked at the sides with yellow longi- 

 tudinally, paler ventrally. On joints 3 and 4 the streaks continue 

 over the dorsum, confluent in a dorsal band; on joints 8,*9 and 10 

 is a narrow yellow line between the bases of the horns, and on joint 

 II a large bright yellow dorsal patch. Length about 7 mm. 



Second Stage. — Head subtriangular, notched on top, dark 

 wine-red. Mouth and triangular plate (clypeus) paler shaded; 

 maxilL-e black. Width i.i mm. From the cervical shield a pair 

 of branching horns with small spur, all relatively smaller than before, 

 the bfanches hardly more than large spurs, minutely transversely 

 creased, dark wine-red. The body lacks all the other horns and the 

 anal feet are long. Body wine-red, finely streaked with yellow on 

 the sides, and also on the back on joints 3, 4 and 13. An inter- 

 rupted yellow dorsal stripe, widening on joints 10 and 11, and end- 

 ing abrupdy at the end of joint 11, absent on joints 2, 5 and 7. 

 Anal plate and all the fe.et dark. As the stage progresses joints 2-4 

 become pale green, except a narrow wine-red dorsal line. The sub- 

 ventral region on joints 5, 6, 8 and 9, and a broader area on joints 

 11-13 is pale greenish. 



Third Stage.— Head parabolic in outline, flat in front, and 

 notched a little at the vertex; wine-red, closely covered with little, 

 round, pale, yellowish spots, partly confluent posteriorly. In front 

 a broad, pale, yellow, vertical band, widening inferiorly to the width 

 of the base of the triangular plate, its sides once indented by the 

 red ground color above the middle and the sutures also red. Labrum 



