498 LEPIDOPTERA. 



tenths of an inch in length, and are of a light ochre or 

 buff color, with a reddish head. When about six weeks 

 old, they leave the grain, and get into cracks, or around 

 the sides of corn-bins, and each one then makes itself a 

 *little oval pod or cocoon, about as large as a grain of wheat. 

 The insects of the first brood, as before said, come out of 

 their cocoons, in the winged form, in July and August, 

 and lay their eggs for another brood; the others remain 

 unchanged in their cocoons, through the winter, and take 

 the chrysalis form in March or April following. Three 

 weeks afterwards, the shining brown chrysalis forces itself 

 part way out of the cocoon, by the help of some little sharp 

 points on its tail, and bursts open at the other end, so as 

 to allow the moth therein confined to come forth. 



From various statements, deficient however in exactness, 

 that have appeared in some of our agricultural journals, 

 I am led to think that this corn-moth, or an insect much 

 like it in its habits, prevails in all parts of the country, 

 and that it has generally been mistaken for the grain-weevil. 

 Many years ago I remember to have seen oats and shelled 

 corn (maize) affected in the way above described ; and Dr. 

 Asa Fitch has favored me with a grain-moth, obtained in 

 a flour-mill at East Greenwich. New York, which agreed 



7 ' O 



with the descriptions and figures of the European Tinea 

 granella. In some remarks upon this insect in the Albany 

 "Cultivator," for January, 1847, he states that the Amer- 

 ican insect was observed to make its cocoon within the 

 webs among the grain, instead of retiring therefrom when 

 about to undergo its transformations. The habits of the 

 European grain-moth are probably sometimes varied ; for, 

 although most writers on its history agree in saying that 

 the insect leaves the grain and conceals itself in crevices 

 of the granary when preparing to make its cocoon, Olivier* 

 expressly states that it undergoes its transformation in its 

 web among the grain. 



* Encyclopedic M^thodique, Insectes, Tom. IV. p. 114. 



