﻿NOTES AND OBSERVATIONS. 65 



say that the portion of the eoast on which the insect dwells is 

 almost bare, there being only about six blades of grass to the square 

 foot, besides which the land is occasionally flooded. On the way a 

 few Chrysophanus phlaas were netted, but were of the usual summer 

 form, and beyond some var. caruleopunctata were quite typical ; a 

 few Pararge viegcsra and Epinephele ianira were also seen. We then 

 accidentally met Mr. A. Murray, to whom much of the success of our 

 trip was due, for in addition to accompanying us, whenever possible, 

 he placed his valuable local knowledge freely at our disposal. We 

 proceeded to search for pupae of L. gueneei. These may be obtained 

 by raking the sand with the fingers when the sand is perfectly dry 

 and capable of being drifted by the wind, and where the grass seems 

 half dead. The pupae are not deeper than an inch or two, and 

 tumble easily out of their frail cocoons, and as they have the helpful 

 habit of wriggling to the surface after disturbance, it is advisable to 

 pay a second visit for those overlooked. We found one or two 

 imagines struggling on the sand, apparently knocked off the food- 

 plant by our raking about. We went for the imago in the evening, 

 but owing to rain collecting was none too pleasant, and though we 

 searched carefully we could not see a single specimen of L. gueneei. 

 Mr. Murray, who was a little way behind, came up to us and said : 

 " Can't see any ! Why there are one, two, three, four, five quite close 

 to you," and so there were, as we could readily see when they were 

 pointed out to us. The difficulty of seeing this moth in sitil is hard 

 to realize until you start to work for it. It clings low down on its 

 food-plant, quite close to the sand, the colour of which it closely 

 mimics, and unless you shine your light about six feet ahead of you, 

 on to the grass, you stand small chance of taking the species in quan- 

 tity, as it appears not to fly. The females, I should say, never fly, as 

 their bodies are very heavy, and the wings do not appear to be 

 capable of supporting them. The male is rare, and not so often taken 

 as the female. Probably if a sheet were erected the male would be 

 found to come to light, but not in large quantities, as the proportion 

 of males bred from pupae was very small. The species is abundant 

 in its restricted haunt, but is in danger of extermination at St. 

 Anne's, as the Council are building a new Promenade along the sea- 

 front, and will soon be up to the gueneei locality which it will cover. 

 On our return home that evening we glanced at the ragwort heads, 

 and, though raining heavily, we took a nice series of Hydrcecia 

 nictitans var. (? species) paludis, Miana Uterosa, M. furuncula (the 

 St. Anne's form of this latter species seems to be very light, practi- 

 cally a unicolorous, pale ochreous grey), one or two Agrotis tritici 

 and a few A. nigricans wsii'.ftimosa. 



The next evening was devoted to ragwort heads on the Blackpool 

 side of the town ; there was a strong cold wind blowing in from the 

 sea, so conditions were far from perfect ; nevertheless, moths were on 

 the heads in plenty, but the violent movements of the blossoms made 

 boxing and selection a very difficult task. We experienced this diffi- 

 culty every night, and though we tried to select a more or less 

 sheltered dip in the dunes, it was generally impossible to escape the 

 wind. The Agrotids did not seem to mind how strong a gale was 



ENTOM. — MARCH, 1915. G 



