NOTES, CAPTURES, ETC. 261 



some remarks at p. 234 of this Magazine. Without commenting 

 on that article, I may state for the guidance of others that I am 

 always most successful in rearing varieties when I feed the 

 species all through, while in the larval stage, with the same kind 

 of food. — C. Smethurst ; 25, Chatham Street, Leeds. 



Insects and their Food-plants. — About two years ago I 

 drew attention in the pages of the ' Entomologist ' to the 

 wonderful instinct possessed b}^ insects in discovering plants to feed 

 upon not indigenous or common in cultivation, but which have 

 an affinity to those native plants on which their larvae are 

 generally met with, instancing the BudcUea glohosa, an American 

 shrub of ornamental character, with the little weevil Cionus 

 schropularice. I now again find the same shrub this season 

 almost denuded of its leaves by a schropulariaceous feeder of 

 another order, namely, the larva of the common mullein moth, 

 Cucidlia verbasci, in a friend's garden at Croydon. Fortunately 

 for him the larvse, being of a very conspicuous and show}' 

 character and in considerable numbers (more than would fill a 

 pint measure), were detected by his boys before too much 

 mischief had been done ; and as a consequence the young 

 collectors of the neighbourhood were only too anxious to transfer 

 to their breeding-cages what would have been a nuisance and an 

 eyesore had they not been discovered in time. — V. R. Perkins ; 

 20, Gloucester Street, S.W., August 20, 1881. 



Entomological Notes from 'Bournemouth. — About the 

 beginning of July last a fine specimen of Deiopeia pulchella was 

 caught by a lady in a garden in this town. I have also to record 

 the capture of several specimens of Sphinx convolvuli during the 

 early part of September ; three were brought to me alive and in 

 fine condition, iind I was informed that others were captured in 

 various parts of the town ; but while congratulating ourselves on 

 the addition of one or two "good things" to our cabinets, we have 

 to deplore the general scarcity of our usual autumn species. 

 Sugaring here during the last ten weeks has been an entire 

 failure ; an occasional earwig or spider regaling itself in solitary 

 luxuriance on our sweets is about the only living thing that greets 

 the expectant eye of the collector. Even the bold Xylophasia 

 polyoclon and persistently intrusive Phlogopliora vieticulosa are 

 "conspicuously absent." The usually abundant and ubiquitous 



