THE STATE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



73 



in the ground, and had, furthermore, the peculiarity of looping up the 

 back when in motion, in the same manner as does the Canker-worm, 

 and as do all other geometers or span worms. After the first moult, 

 which took place six days after hatching, the dark spots became al- 

 most obliterated, the characteristic markings of this same Variegated 

 cut-worm which I had received from Mr. Bush, began to appear, and 

 they lost their looping habit. At this time they grew at an incredible 

 rate, becoming thicker in proportion to their length as they grew older, 

 and by the 15th of June, those which hatched on the 24th of May, had 

 shed their skins four times, and gone into the ground, where they 

 formed oval cocoons of earth, and in two days more were changed 

 into chrysalids. By the 20th of June the moths began issuing, thus 

 requiring but 35 days to go through all their transformations. 



These worms were very voracious, and after the first moult, showed 

 the true cut-worm characteristic of concealing themselves during the 

 day, and feeding at night. Moreover, they proved to be quite univer- 

 sal feeders, for while I fed them, when young, on cabbage and grape- 

 vine leaves, they flourished exceedingly, the latter part of their lives, 

 on the leaves of the White mulberry ; and on the 16th of June, I dug 

 up from my garden, two full grown specimens of this same kind of 

 worm, which produced the same species of moth, each of them having 

 severed a young lettuce plant. From the foregoing, it is manifest that 

 all cut-worm moths do not deposit their eggs on the ground, and from 

 the fact that these eggs were found, in one instance, on a leaf, so early 

 in the season, they were undoubtedly deposited in the spring by a 

 moth which must have passed the winter either in the chrysalis or 

 moth state ; and as the insect goes through its transformations so rap- 

 idly, there are most likely two broods during the year. From the fore- 

 going experience, and from the fact that most other moths attach their 

 eggs to different substances, I think it not unlikely that our cut-worm 

 moths do the same, as a general rule, instead of depositing them in, or 

 on the ground, as has heretofore been supposed ; and Mr. Cochran 

 has related to me a curious incident which bears me out in this belief. 

 He is in the habit of gathering, during the winter, all crumpled 

 leaves and egg-masses which he finds in his orchard, and of placing 

 them in a drawer in his secretary. Last spring he was astonished to 

 find several half-grown cut-worms in this drawer, they having evi- 

 dently hatched from some of the eggs, and fed entirely on some apples 

 which chanced at that time to be in the drawer. 



The moth produced from this cut-worm is represented at Plate 1, 

 Figure 1. Its general color is a dark brownish-gray, some specimens 

 being almost black along the front edge of the upper wings, while 

 others have this edge of a dull golden-buff color. The Noctuid.e, to 

 which our cut-worm moths belong, have not yet been worked up by 

 any one in this country, and as they are all of sombre colors, and as 

 the species, in many instances, very closely resemble each other, it is 

 not an easy matter to properly determine them. The species under 



