201 
made out. It lives in the roots of the birdsfoot trefoil (Lotus Corniculatus). I 
was led to find it here by noticing in the dry summer of 1871 the withered state of 
its food plant. The presence of a faded spray or two in an otherwise green mass of 
trefoili was a pretty sure indication that alarva wasat work. Living some distance 
underground, the larva when full-fed spins a compact and strong silken tube up to 
the surface of the soil to enable the moth to emerge afterwards without difficulty. 
Those I had in confinement continued to construct this tube, though it was no 
longer necessary, since the roots they were feeding on were out of the ground. 
Cynipiformis is another common species here, occurring both in woods and 
open country, but especially in the latter. The larva may be found in the bark of 
very old or injured oak trees, but it is difficult to get it out in these situations, and 
a far better place to look for it is in oak stumps the year after falling, that have 
been left in the ground. Sometimes quite a colony may be found in a single 
stump, and as the larva feeds just under the bark and does not enter the wood, a 
good strong knife turns them out very readily. 
Tipuliformis, a common species in many places, but not so here. It feeds 
inside the young shoots of the black currant. To obtain it you are advised to cut 
the shoots indiscrimately, but this is a clumsy extravagant method and quite 
unnecessary. The larva when it is hatched generally enters the stem through a 
bud or in the region of a bud, and if in the early spring just before the buds open 
the eye is run up the previous year’s shoots, the presence of a dead bud or a small 
black hole in its neighbourhood at once betrays the whereabouts of a larva. 
Sphegiformis.—This is the best species that occurs here. It is completely a 
wood-frequenting insect, and affects the woods that are hilly and have a south 
aspect. The larva makes a straight burrow in the solid wood of alder saplings 
and occasionally in those of birch. The burrow is rather large for a moth of this 
size. The larva does not I think make any cocoon, but when full-fed scoops out a 
curved chamber at the top of the burrow close to the surface of the stem, leaving 
only the thinnest layer of cuticle at the head, through which the moth has after- 
wards no difficulty in breaking out. 
Bembcciformis exceedingly abundant. Not a wood can be cut down but the 
burrows of its larve are to be seen in almost every sallow pole. 
Apiformis is rather local but common in some spots. The larva lives in the 
trunk of the black and some other poplars close to the ground, and sometimes in 
the roots. Generally when this insect has taken possession of a tree it keeps to it 
year after year, till the lower part is riddled with the holes through which the 
moths have escaped. It is quite possible however for the entomologist to work 
away for some time in such a tree without finding the insect, at least I have done 
so before now till I found out the way to proceed. The grub appears to enter the 
tree below the surface of thesoil, at any rateits burrow hasa discharging opening below 
the surface, through which all the frassis ejected. By removing then the soil in the 
month of April, about which time the larva has spun up, the presence of fresh 
frass at once indicates a tenanted burrow, and by slitting it up the cocoon will be 
found ;“not uncommonly too, the cocoon occurs in the soil itself close against the 
