LEPIDOPTERA OF NEW YORK AND NEIGHBORING STATES 671 



3. TROPJEA Hiibner 



(Actias, in part; Attacus, in part) 



Male antennae very broad and plumose, doubly bipectinate, with equal branches; 

 narrow, with alternate branches only half as long in female. Front with conical 

 tuft, palpi distinct. Fore wing with arched costa, rounded apex, and somewhat 

 concave, rarely scalloped, outer margin; hind wing with general form an equilateral 

 triangle, but inner margin drawn out into a long twisted tail, supported by veins 

 M 3 , Cu and A. R t long-stalked (fig. 414) with R 2+3 , R, distinct, R 4 shortly stalked. 

 Upper discocellnlar rather short (unlike Actias), M t and M 2 strongly divergent, 

 cell closed, the vein crossing a transparent spot. Hind wing with dorsal venation 

 somewhat crowded, costal widely spaced; middle discocellular very long and 

 longitudinal, as well as upper discocellular; cell closed like that of fore wing. 

 Male abdomen rather small and conical in repose ; female abdomen more cylin- 

 drical. Fore wings thrown back over hind wings in repose. The moth hybrid- 

 izes with Actias selene, and the genera should probably be united. 



Eggs laid in small groups, dark brown, blotched with white. First-state larvae 

 densely spinose, but with no unpaired spine on ninth segment of abdomen; green, 

 rarely longitudinally striped with black; with black-barred head, secondary hair 

 notably denser than in Telea; in later stages, body less humped than in Telea; 

 turning dark brown immediately before pupation. 



1. T. luna Linnaeus (Empress, luna moth). Wing membrane bright green, par- 

 tially covered with scales which are almost all bright yellow in male, largely white 

 in female. Body white, a pinkish powdery band across collar, and on costa of fore 

 wings, joined by a bar to discal ocellus ; a waved crimson stripe on abdomen ; 

 fringes typically yellow. A black yellow, crimson, white, and transparent discal 

 eyespot on each wing. The earlier spring specimens are variety rubromarginata 

 Davis, and have the margins broadly edged with crimson, the costal stripe deeper 

 red, and the postmedial line almost always distinct. The subtropical race dictynna 

 Walker has shorter tails. 100 mm. (H 12:7.) 



May and June; August. Caterpillar at first green with black and white head, 

 later usually with green head (rarely reddish like T. polyphemus) ; each segment 

 of body with a fine white line around the sides and back. Food walnut, birch, 

 beech, and many other trees. Cocoon thin but tough, of a single layer of brown silk 

 (heavier and white in dictynna). 



Common and general, especially in wooded regions. Two broods (the second 

 apparently partial). New York: Buffalo, Rock City, (Cattaraugus county), Ithaca, 

 Trenton Falls, Oneonta, Schoharie, Albany, Saratoga Springs, New Windsor, Staten 

 Island, Brooklyn. 



4. TELEA Hiibner 

 (Attacus, in part) 



Male antennae plumose, wider than in any other Saturniid, equally doubly bipec- 

 tinate, female antennae narrower than in Tropaea, with alternate pectinations 

 vestigial, palpi minute. Body larger than in Tropaea. Fore wing with rounded, 

 but strongly falcate apex. Rj free, R 2 lost, upper discocellular very long, longer 

 than in hind wing, and longitudinal, middle discocellular nearly obsolete. Hind 

 wing with outer margin bent at middle, and often somewhat waved, apex often a 

 little produced. Cells closed. 



Eggs white, with a brown band around the edge, laid in small groups, Cater- 

 pillars (fig. 417) very strongly humped, hardly more than twice as long as high 

 when at rest. Cocoon ovoid, densely woven of two firm layers with a little floss- 

 silk between, without trapdoor; rarely, suspended by running a band of silk up 

 to the stem along the petiole of one of the leaves in which it is enclosed, and 



