OF THE STATE ENTOMOLOGIST. 29 



etation," by mistake described the second species as the true vernata 

 of Peciv, and distinguished the real re/v^^^a by the name o{ pometaria, 

 hesitatini;- as to whether or not it should be considered specifically dis- 

 tinct from the other. Most subsequent authors have followed Harris 

 in his definition of Peck's species, and Mr. Mann himself did so till 

 Mr. H. K. Morrison drew his attention to the original description and 

 pointed out the error. The consequence is that the larger form re- 

 mains to this day unnamed, but will doubtless be known di's, potnetaria 

 Mann, the pomataria Harr. being a synonym of vernata. 



In the article in my second lieport I have described the genuine 

 <oernata.i simply because it is the most numerous in my cabinet, and 

 considered, with most previous authors, that the two were but varieties 

 of one species. The figures in the cut (66), accompanying that article, 

 as should have been stated at the time, were not drawn by myself, but 

 were prepared in New York by the publishers of the Rural Neu-' 

 Yor.kei\ from the figures of Harris and Packard. They are all very 

 poor, though it is evident the male represents the true vernata Peck, 

 and the female the pometaria Mann, enlarged. 



Mr. Mann gives some reasons for believing that vernata Peck, true 

 to its name, is purely vernal in habit, and does not issue in the fall, 

 while pometaria Mann issues for the most part in the fall of the year — 

 a fact, if future experience establish it, of high, practical importance. 



It is well known that in Philadelphia, as in many other eastern 

 cities, the Canker-worm was formerly a great nuisance, not only be- 

 cause of the injury it did to the elms and other shade trees, but because 

 it was continually spinning down on to persons who happened to be 

 passing underneath the infested trees. I noticed when in the Quaker 

 city last fall, an unusual abundance of the gaily colored and hairy 

 larvae of the White-marked Tussock-moth;* and upon inquiring of my 

 friend Meehan, as to whether they were ordinarily so abundant, 1 was 

 surprised to learn that they had only increased to such an alarming 

 extent since the introduction of the English sparrow. The idea pre- 

 vails that in proportion as this bird exterminated the Canker-worm 

 which formerly held such sway, in that proportion the hairy Tussock- 

 moth larva, which is distasteful to the bird, increased, until it has 

 come to be as much of a nuisance as was the looping scourge whose 

 place it has usurped. We are thus brought face to face with another 

 phase of the bird-insect question, and so far as the English sparrow is 

 concerned, the Philadelphians may well ask, in the expressive lan- 

 guage of the time : " Does protection protect i"- 



*l.stRep., Fiir. 82. 



