INSECTS AT WORK AND PLAY. 



137 



PLUME 

 MOTH 

 MIMICKING 

 GRASS. 



times ap- 



Many caterpillars are protected by mimicry. 

 The loopers, as they are called, fix themselves by 

 their claspers to a branch, and by making their 

 bodies stand out rigidly from it give themselves 

 the appearance of little twigs, as shown in the 

 illustrations on page 139. 



The devastation wrought by 

 butterflies, moths, and beetles 

 in the caterpillar stage 

 of their existence 

 amongst plants 



is some- 



Z^>^ r \\\ - - 



palling. Whole 



forests are de- 

 nuded of their leaves, 

 and hedgerows transfigured 

 in their appearance from the vernal 

 wealth of summer to the beggarly 

 bareness and brown desolation of 

 winter. 



Our first illustration (p. 140) shows 

 a portion of a ragwort plant killed by caterpillars 

 of the Cinnabar moth, and the second (p. 141) a 

 colony of caterpillars of the Buff-tip moth destroy- 

 ing a hazel leaf the ninth attacked in their all- 

 consuming advance from the end of the branch. 



The speed at which these creatures can eat 

 is nothing less than marvellous. Last spring I 

 made some observations on the gastronomical 



