FEATHERED THORN. 279 



a photograph by Mr. H. Main. The caterpillar feeds on the 

 foliage of oak, birch, sallow, hawthorn, sloe, plum, larch, etc. ; 

 it grows very slowly, and may be beaten out in most of the 

 months from July to October. The moth is out in May and 

 June, and sometimes earlier. Pretty generally distributed over 

 the British Isles, but not noted in the Orkneys or Shetlands. 

 The range abroad extends to Amurland and Japan. 



^l*^*** I .pji; leathered Thorn {Himcra {Colotois) pennaria). 



^"'^ A more or less typical but rather small male specimen is 



shown on Plate 114, Fig. 4, but the ground colour is frequently 

 more tawny in tint, and sometimes it is much paler inclining 

 to yellowish ; the cross lines may be either wider apart, or 

 closer together, and the inner one is often clouded with 

 blackish ; sometimes both lines become almost bandlike ; the 

 submarginal, usually interrupted, line is occasionally well 

 defined. The female, often browner than the specimen de- 

 picted (Fig. 5) is frequently tinged with purple, and occasionally 

 with pink. 



The batch of eggs, as deposited, was photographed by Mr. 



Main. The q.%% is olive green with a ring of pale specks around 



the micropylar end. The caterpillar is slaty grey inclining to 



purplish, with a series of not clearly defined ochreous diamonds 



on the back and a row of ochreous dots on each side ; the 



raised points on the last ring are tipped with reddish (Plate 116). 



It feeds on oak, birch, poplar, sallow, apple, hawthorn, sloe, 



I etc. April to June. The moth is out in October and November, 



! but is seldom noticed in the daytime ; at night, the males are 



! frequently seen at gas and electric hght. The species is 



\ generally common in woodlands, especially as caterpillars, 



over the southern half of England and Wales, and occurs more 



or less frequently over the rest of the country, also in Scotland 



to Moray, and in Ireland. 



