122 PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL MUSEUM. 



ACRONYCTA SPINIGERA Guen6e. 

 (Plates XII, fig. 5, female adult; XVII, fig. 26, leg; XX, fig. 1!', male genitalia.) 



Acronycta spimgera Guen1^;e, Spec. Gen., Noct., 1852, 1, p. 4.5. — Walker, Cat. Brit. 



Mus., Hat., 1856, IX, p. 55.— Smith, Bull. U. S. Nat. Mus. No. 44, 1893, p. 39. 

 Apalela spiiiUjera Grotk, 111. Essay, 1882, p. 39; Bull. U. S. Geol. Surv,, 1883, VI, 



p. 572. 

 Apatvla harveyana Gkotk, Proc. Ac. Nat. Sci. Phila., 1875, p. 418; 111. Essay, 1882, 



]t. 39, spinij/era Walker in i)art. 



Ground color ii very i)jile ashen gray, with a slightly yellowish tinge. 

 Thorax with a smoky line near the tip, and a more or less obvious 

 smoky unirgin to the ])atagiae. Sometimes a smoky line crosses the 

 frout below the anteunao. The wings have the vestiture slightly 

 elevated, and there is a considerable covering of smoky scales, which 

 occasionally darkens the wing. The ordinary markings are well writ- 

 ten. The basal line is distinct, geminate, and usually reaches to the 

 basal dash. The transverse anterior line is brown or black, distinctly 

 geminate, and as a whole outwardly obli(iuo, very little irregular. The 

 median shade line is well marked over the costa, extending obli(iuely 

 into the reniform. From that point it runs a little inward to the inner 

 margin, but is much fainter, and in some cases altogether Avanting. 

 The transverse posterior line is geminate, the inner portion very faint 

 and sometimes scarcely marked, the intervening space whitish, the 

 outer line black, lunulate, and more or less denticulate on the veins. 

 As a whole it is sijuarely bent over the cell and deeply incurved opi)0- 

 site the anal angle. There is an irregular, diffuse, subterminal line, 

 which is pale and variably marked through the terminal space. There 

 may or may not be a series of blackish spots, most evident toward the 

 apex of the Aving. There is a- series of terminal dots, beyond which 

 the fringes are also nuirked with dusky. There is a slender black 

 streak at the ba*se, extending to the inner portion of the transverse 

 anterior line, but not across it in any specimen that I have seen. Just 

 opposite the cell there is a bhu^k line which extends from the subter- 

 minal line inward, and indents the transverse posterior line, but does 

 not cross it in any of the specimens before me. A slender black line 

 extends inwardly througli the submedian interspace and across the 

 transverse ])osterior line at that point. The ordinary spots are well 

 marked and of moderate size; the orbicular round or nearly so, black 

 ringed, sometimes with a smoky center; the reniform kidney shaped, 

 distinctly black ringed, witli a more or less well-mai'ked smoky center. 

 The secondaries are smoky in the male, a little paler at base; in the 

 female more dusky throughout. Beneath whitish, ])owdery, the prima- 

 ries often a little smoky on the disk; both wings with a more or less 

 obvious outer line and discal lunule. 



Expanse, 1.50 to 1.80 inches (37 to 45 mm.). 



JTahifdt. — Maine to Texas; west to the Mississippi; 'New York in 

 June J Wisconsin; Kansas City, Missouri, May 22. 



