INSECTS 



The county is an attractive one from the fact that two of our rarest British moths 

 (Lasdocampa ilicifolia, L. and Notodonta bicolor, Hb.) were first captured within its bounds. 

 The first authentic British record of L. ilicifiHa was of a specimen taken by Atkinson on 

 Cannock Chase on 17 May, 1851, although Stephens had previously described this moth as 

 British in 1828, and it is figured by Humphreys and Westwood, but at that time no British 

 specimen was known. Atkinson's insect was exhibited at a meeting of the Entomological 

 Society in London on 2 June, 1851, by Mr. Smith. Since then other specimens have been 

 taken on Cannock Chase by Partridge, Weaver and the Brothers Bonney, and on the 

 17 May, 1896, an anniversary of the date of the capture of the first insect of this species, 

 Dr. Freer took the last recorded example of this moth from that locality. Larvae have since 

 been met with in the same locality. N. bicolor, Hb., the other rare British insect before 

 mentioned, was taken in the Burnt Woods in Staffordshire on several occasions in 1861 and 

 following years. The only other reputed British locality for this insect is Killarney, in Ire- 

 land. The actual number of species of the various families recorded as having been met 

 with in Staffordshire is as follows : 



British Liat Staffordshire List 



Rhopalocera ........ 65 42 



Heterocera 



Sphinges ........ 39 23 



Bombyces ....... 1 1 1 69 



Noctuae ........ 324 182 



Geometrae ....... 280 178 



Pyralides ........ 78 34 



Pterophori ....... 37 11 



Crambi ........ 83 27 



Tortrices . ....... 343 144 



Tineae ........ 720 238 



2,080 948 



The principal authorities on the Macro-Lepicloptera of Staffordshire are Garner's 

 Natural History of the County of Stafford, published in 1840 ; Sir O. Mosley's Natural History 

 of Tutbury, published in 1863, which contains a list of the Lepidoptera of the Burton district 

 by the well-known entomologist, Mr. Edwin Brown ; Contributions to the Fauna and Flora of 

 Repton, by Mr. W. Garneys and others (ed. 2, 1881) ; the Annual Reports of the North Staf- 

 fordshire Field Club (1866 to 1906) ; a paper on 'the Lepidoptera of Burton-on-Trent and 

 neighbourhood,' which first appeared in the Entomologist for 1885, and was afterwards 

 reprinted with additions in the Transactions of the Burton-on-Trent Natural History Society for 

 1889 ; besides various notes and papers which have appeared in the Entomologist, the Midland 

 Naturalist, and other Natural History magazines and works on Entomology. In the following 

 list the records of Macro-Lepidoptera are taken from the reports of the North Staffordshire 

 Field Club unless otherwise stated. 



Much less attention has been given to the Micro-Lepidoptera. Mr. Brown's list com- 

 prised some 280 species of Tortrices and Tineae ; Mr. C. G. Barrett collected sixty species, 

 chiefly at Cannock, in June 1886 (Report N.S.F.C. 1887, p. 13), and in 1880 the Rev. T. W. 

 Daltry contributed his first notes on the subject to the same publication. In 1891 

 (Report, p. 17) seventy-nine species had been recorded by him, and subsequently a few more 

 have been added. In 1892 Messrs. J. T. Harris and P. B. Mason published a list of the 

 Crambi, Tortrices, and Tineae of the Burton district (Transactions Burton-on-Trent Natural 

 History Society, ii, p. l), while in the Report of the North Staffordshire Field Club for 

 1899, p. 60, Mr. E. D. Bostock recorded 17 species, many of which were new to 

 the county list. The present list also contains a number of records by Messrs. W. G. 

 Blatch and R. C. Bradley, for which I am indebted to Mr. C. J. Wainwright, and Dr. R. 

 Freer has contributed a list of 131 species taken by himself in the Rugeley district and the 

 adjoining part of Cannock Chase. 



E. B = E. Brown. C. G. B. - C. G. Barrett. T. W. D = Rev. T. W. Daltry. 



B. L. = Burton Society, List of Macro-Lepidoptera (1885-9). 



B. S. = J. T. Harris and Dr. Mason (1892). E. D. B. = E. D. Bostock. 



C. J. W. = C. J. Wainwright. R. C. B. = R. C. Bradley. 



W. G. B. = W. G. Blatch. R. F. = Dr. R. Freer. 



i 97 '3 



