106 REPORT UPON COTTON INSECTS. 



remembered that during the greater part of the time while he was in 

 the field the weather was unusually cold, so that hibernating insects 

 would not be likely to be out from their places of concealment ; and that, 

 as Mr. Schwarz has well said, the failure to find the hiding place of the 

 cotton-moth is not proof that the species does not hibernate, for he also 

 failed to find in their winter quarters other insects which are very com- 

 mon, and respecting the hibernation of which there is no doubt. 



Although we firmly believe (both from the a posteriori reasons, which 

 will be given at length in the chapter on the theory of migrations, and 

 from positive evidence to be soon brought forward) that the cotton- 

 moth hibernates in some portions of the cotton belt of the United States, 

 we have given these negative results at length, not merely for their 

 purely scientific interest, but as furnishing valuable data to be used in 

 making plans for the destruction of this pest. 



The undoubted positive evidence of the hibernation of this insect con- 

 sists of a very limited number of observations ; for although we believe 

 that some at least of the many planters who think they have observed 

 the cotton-moth in midwinter and early spring are right, still the fact 

 that in every instance when specimens of the moths observed have been 

 sent to entomologists it has been found that some other species has been 

 mistaken for Aletia argillacea prevents our accepting testimony of this 

 kind. 



The following list comprises the names of those moths which have 

 been most frequently sent to this department by persons believing them 

 to be the cotton -moth : 



Phoberia atomaris (moth), Georgia. 

 Hypena scdbralis (moth), Georgia. 

 Leucania unipuncta (moth), Alabama. 

 Drasteria erechta, moth. 

 Agrotis (several species). 



But we cannot doubt the statements of so accurate an observer as 

 Mr. Thomas Affleck, who says, in his Southern Eural Almanac, 1851, 

 pp. 49, 50 : 



On the 22d of December last, 1849, I saw great numbers of the cotton-moth during 

 the dusk of the evening flitting about the fence corners, dead trees which still retained 

 their bark, and about certain sheds near this village Washington, Miss. The weather 

 was and had been unseasonably warm. A few cool days followed, during which I 

 could not find a single moth. But again, on the 27th or 28th of the same month, I 

 saw them in equal numbers. I leave it to naturalists to say whether or no this settles 

 the question of hibernation. It is positive evidence, so far as it goes. Whether they 

 continued to exist until the cotton plant was large enough to support their progeny 

 I cannot say ; nor could I satisfy myself as to where they found shelter. 



Equally interesting are the observations of Mr. John T. Humphreys, 

 late naturalist aiid entomologist to the State department of agriculture 

 of Georgia, who says in a letter which we recently received from him : 



. 1st. Tlutt it hibernates in the chrysalis state. This may be true of other "cut-worms" 

 (which in some cases I doubt, while in others I know), but there is not the slightest 



