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THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 
Vou. LIV.) JUNE; 192m. [No. 697 
OXIGRAPHA LITERANA, L.: ITS LIFE-CYCLE, 
DISTRIBUTION, AND VARIATION. 
By W. G. Suerupon, F.Z.8., F.E.S. 
Ir is a remarkable fact that although this species is one of 
the best known, and certainly the most beautiful of our British 
Tortrices, if indeed it is not the most beautiful Lepidopteron now 
to be found in the British Isles, its life-history is practically 
unknown; for though various Lepidopterists have bred odd 
specimens, so far as I am aware the larva has never been iden- 
tified, and its habits and date of pairing and the egg stage are 
quite unknown. 
This is all the more singular because the larva is, for a 
Tortrix, very distinct, and one which is easily recognisable—how 
easily the following incident will show: 
Karly last June, being at Brockenhurst, I called upon Mr. 
George Gulliver, and showed him a few larve I had reared from 
ova, and two or three which I had the same day beaten from 
oak in a wood near Brockenhurst. Mr. Gulliver, although he 
must have taken many hundreds of the imago, had never bred 
the species, or recognised its larva, but a few days afterwards 
he beat some larvee which he recognised as those of O. literana, and 
later on in the summer actually bred out a number of specimens. 
So far as I am aware the specimens that have been casually 
bred have always come out of oak. Barrett says (‘ Lep. Brit. 
Isles,’ x, p. 217), ‘‘ There can be little doubt that it (the larva) 
feeds on oak.’ The latest writer on the species, Kennel (‘ Pal. 
Tort.,’ p. 83), says: “‘ The larva lives from May to August on oak 
(Quercus robur and pedunculata) between spun leaves ; it occurs 
certainly also on maple and birch, probably in two generations, 
the first in May and the beginning of June, the moth in July 
and August, the second in July and August, and the moths 
from September on through the whole autumn and winter.” 
This suggestion that it may have two broods is certainly not 
correct so far as Britain is concerned, though it’ may be inj the 
warmer regions it inhabits. 
Amongst others who have bred it is Mr. South, who in 
‘Entomologist,’ xv, p. 58, reports ‘‘a number bred from larve 
beaten out of oaks ” (in North Deyon). 
There are several references to its feeding upon birch which 
are probably correct, for, as will be seen, it will feed upon the 
ENTOM.—JUNE, 1921. M 
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