t^ ^ 



FAMILY TINEIDAE. 



Ercuiictis flazisfriata W'lsin. (Sugar Cane Bud Moth.) 

 (Plate II. Figs. i-6.) 



"Anlennae yellowisli-whito, with two small grey spots above before the 

 apex. Palpi yellowish-white, brush-like beneath ; the terminal joint very 

 short. Head and thorax yellowish-white. Forewings yellowish-white, 

 indistinct!}^ streaked with broken yellow lines along the fold, along the 

 cell, and below the costa beyond the middle ; also sparsely speckled with 

 black scales, especially beyond the middle; a short blackish streak at the 

 tipturned apex runs to the end of the apical cilia and is joined by a 

 slender golden brown streak along the base of the shining, white costal 

 cilia; terminal cilia whitish cinereous, with a blackish spot in their middle 

 below the apex. Exp. al. 14 mm. Hindwings shining, pale golden yel- 

 lowish, becoming white at the apex ; cilia pale yellowish-grey. Abdomen 

 and legs yellowish-white." [Walsingham, "Fauna Hawaiiensis," I, Pt. V, 

 p. 716, 1907.J 



This niotli is variously known as the "Ijud moth," "bitdworm," 

 or "sheath nioth" of the sugar cane. It is very abundant in all 

 cane fields throughout the Hawaiian Islands. The larvae are 

 always to be found beneath the leaf-sheaths of the older leaves 

 which are partially or completely dead and dried. They are 

 most abundant where no stripping has been done or where there 

 is more or less of a tangled mass of leaves. They normally feed 

 upon the dried leaf-sheaths themselves, also on the leaves. On 

 the sheath they feed on the inner side towards the cane stalk, eat- 

 ing out between the strands of fibers, often burrowing into the 

 substance of the leaf-sheath (Plate I, Fig. i). Besides their 

 normal feeding, however, they often eat ofl^ the surface of the 

 rind for considerable areas, particularly at or just above the 

 nodes where it is apt to be softer ; but they sometimes eat ofif 

 the surface from a whole internode. This eating of the surface is 

 most likely done while the rind is yet growing, before it becomes 

 liardened. 



Besides all this, the worst damage is done when they eat out 

 the buds or "eyes," which they sometimes do for several in suc- 

 cession, or for from one to three feet of the cane stalk (Plate I, 

 Fig. 2). The eating of the leaf-sheaths and the leaves does no 

 .■apparent injury to the cane, as the eating is done on the dead or 



