THAUMETOPOEID/E. By Dr. E. Strand. 148 



6. Family: Thaumetopoeidae. 



This group of moths consisting of about a dozen forms, which until the beginning of this century 

 were always placed with the Notodontids under the generic name of Cnelhoca7npa, lias now been establish- 

 ed as a separate family. This result is especially owmg to researches by American entomologists which have 

 proved the Notodontids to be a much more uniform group than one was hitherto inclined to believe, that family 

 forming a refuge for all Bombicoid genera which it was difficult to place. A certain affinity with the Lymantriids 

 induces us to place them after that family. They are confined to the Palearctic Region. Their nearest 

 relatives, which are presumed to be found either among the Lymantriids or the Lasiocampids, are probably 

 certain American forms of the genera Tolype or Hypopachn, and certain African Lymantriidae and Austra- 

 lian Lasiocampidae. But their true position in classification has not yet been established with certainty, 

 even modern authors still placing them with the Notodontids. Antennae short, not or scarcely half so long as the 

 costal margin of the forewing, bipectinate to the tip in both sexes (shorter in the $); segment with a long 

 tuft of hair directed forward. Eyes naked. No ocelh and no tongue. Palpi very small, hairy and porrect, 

 segment 1 longer and thicker than 2. Thorax covered with erect woolly hair. Abdomen of J with anal 

 tuft, of $ with anal wool. Legs with long hair, hindtibiae only with endspurs, no tibia longer than the femur. 

 Wings thinly scaled, hairy, rather broad, distal margin straight, apex and inner angle rounded, scheme of mark- 

 ings uniform (cf. figures, plate 21 and 23), frenulum always present. Hindwing small and rounded, forewing 

 without a tooth at the inner margin. Venation about as in the Notodontids, areole absent, dorsal vein of 

 forewing with basal fork, vein 5 only slightly developed and equally far from 4 and 6. Veins 6 and 7 of hind- 

 wing always stalked, sometimes also 3 and 4; 8 originates from the base of the wing and bends down to 

 the middle of the anterior margin of the cell. Flight at night. Wings at rest held in roof -shape. 



The eggs are globular and are deposited in clusters or rings and covered with a cement intermixed 

 with the anal wool. The larvae have 16 feet and resemble those of the Lasiocampids; they are stout, cyhndri- 

 cal, short, with uniformly short hair, and with knob-like warts bearing long fine brittle barbed hairs arranged 

 in tufts, which cause violent inflammation on the human skin. On the middle of the back, from segment 4 

 onward, there are so-called mirror-spots. The larvae are gregarious, living in nests, which they leave at night in 

 regular processions (hence the name ,,processionary caterpillars") in search of food and to which they return in 

 the same way. They pupate in the nest, forming elongate rounded cocoons intermixed with hair, or they go 

 into the sand to pupate more singly. Beetles of the genus Calosoma {C. sycophanta L. and inquisitor L.) often 

 occur in the nests and destroy the larvae. The caterpillars either march one behind the other or with 

 one in the first row, two in the second, three in the third, etc., up to fifteen to twenty in the last. In 

 T. processionea one larva marches in front, another following with its head close to the first, then a third 

 and a fourth marching in the same way; in the next section there are two marching abreast, then three, four, 

 etc., until six or seven march in one row. Towards the end the procession, which is one or two yards 

 long, narrows again and finishes with one or two larvae. Slowly they move along, always the nose of one larva 

 touching the preceding specimen. The hairs of the larvae contain a great deal of formic acid, and moreover 

 ferments are said to increase the inflammation and terrible itchmg. The inflammation reappears after from 

 two to nine weeks and can be very dangerous, especially in the eyes. The pupae sometimes hibernate twice. 



Only one genus: 



Genus: Tliauiiictopooa Hbn. 

 The characters are those of the family. 



Th. solitaria i?'rr. (23c), from Asia Mnor, Sji'ia and European Turkey, is closely allied to the follow- solikiria. 

 ing species, but the hindwing is quite white without any transverse band, at most with a small dark 

 marginal spot at the anal angle, the inner transverse hne of the forewing is almost straight and the apex 

 of the forewing more produced. (^ 25, $31 mm. Larva in May and June on Pistacea terebinthus; it is 

 fairly densely clothed with long yellowish white hairs. 



T. processionea L. (21 k). cj with grejash white forewing bearing lighter and darker transverse Unes, processio- 

 with an narrow pure white transverse band at the base, and in the proximal half of the marginal area two "''''• 

 blackish parallel transverse lines with a narrow white outer edge and anteriorly united by a dark smear; 

 hindwing with an obsolescent greyish transverse band. $ on the whole larger, the dark transverse lines obso- 

 lescent or absent, hindwing greyish. S 29, ? 32 mm. (cf. pinivom). Central Europe (with the exception 

 of England), South-Eastern Turkey, Northern and Central Italy and Northern Spain. — luctifica Stgr. is much luclifica. 



