264 FIRST APPEARANCES OF BIRDS, INSECTS, ETC. 



but only one V. norvegica was captured. Only a few later wasps 

 were observed at Norden before I left home in the middle of 

 August for some weeks, and after my return, and they were 

 reported as unusually scarce during my absence. (E. R. B.) 



HUMBLE BEES. "GREAT MIGRATION OF BUMBLE BEES." 

 Under this heading some extremely interesting observations on 

 the movements of one of the common species of Humble Bee, 

 viz., Bonibus teirestris, along the Poole Sandbanks in September, 

 1905, were recorded by the late Mr. Alexander M. Luckham in 

 "The Entomologist," XXXIX., 65 (iqo6). From September ist 

 to 1 3th countless thousands of these bees were seen flying 

 southwards in a regular stream day after day, nor was a single 

 one observed going in the opposite direction, while from 

 September i3th to 2gth a similar stream kept passing north- 

 wards, not a bee being seen heading towards the south ! 

 (E. R. B.) 



LEPIDOPTERA IN 1906. For truly indigenous Lepidoptera, 

 both large and small, the season of 1906 proved, in my experi- 

 ence, sadly unproductive in East Dorset, and, notwithstanding 

 the beautiful weather, which proved all that the entomologist 

 could desire, the great majority of the better-class species that 

 were especially searched for, were either more or less scarce, or 

 else apparently absent, nor do I think that they have, as yet, 

 nearly recovered from the effects of the wholesale destruction 

 wrought among them by the disastrous weather conditions 

 experienced in 1903. But 1906 will ever be memorable for the 

 sudden appearance, at the end of May and the beginning of 

 June, in East Dorset, as in various other parts of the south 

 coast of England, of considerable numbers of several different 

 kinds of Lepidoptera, some of which are usuallv very rare in 

 Britain, being unable to survive our winters, whilst all are well- 

 known migrants. The species that thus appeared, having 

 doubtless flown over from the Continent, were Vanessa cardui, 

 L., Phryxus livornica, Esp., Heliothis peliigera, Schiff., Plusia 

 gamma, L., Nomophila noctuella, Schiff., and Plutella maculipennis, 

 Crt., and there is every reason for believing that a flight of 



