110 CATERPILLARS AND THEIR MOTHS 



These moths have tongues long enough to reach the 

 nectar of Japanese honeysuckles, nasturtiums, and 

 similar flowers, but not long enough for the deeper 

 honeysuckles and day-lilies. They fly after dark, and 

 have a very strong, rapid flight. They are eaten by 

 several kinds of birds — blackbirds, robins, orioles, and 

 even English sparrows. 



The Other of Us was called down-stairs one day to 

 " come and see an English sparrow waltzing on the 

 lawn with a humming-bird." On reaching the lawn 

 she found the sparrow trying to fly away with a fine 

 pcmdorus moth, evidently not long out of the pupa, 

 though its wings were dry and fully developed. She 

 drove away the sparrow and put the moth in a safe 

 place on a woodbine ; but it did not stay there, and its 

 fluttering along the ground soon drew the attention of 

 the sparrows, and again one of them seized it, suc- 

 ceeded in detaching three of its wings, and flew away 

 with the body and one wing before any one saw that 

 the moth was in need of help. 



Orioles, as well as sparrows, frequent woodbines and 

 destroy many more moths and caterpillars than the 

 noisy English sparrows, going quietly and systemati- 

 cally to work, examining every stem and leaf, and 

 carrying to their j^oung in the nest hundreds of nijjro)i, 

 achenion, ^iandorus, nessus, and abhotii larvae. Indeed, 

 orioles are more destructive to more species of cater- 

 pillars than any other birds we have watched, for they 

 eat and carry to their young the hairy Clisiocanipa, or 

 "tent-caterpillars," and eat the Hijphanir'm cunea, or 

 "fall web-worms," in immense numbers, eating also 

 the pupae of the " forest tent-caterpillars," which they 



