igoo] ENTOMOLOGICAL NEV/S. 461 



Some Hints for Rearing Larvae. 



By F. H. Foster. 



With the hope of helping some fellow worker over difficul- 

 culties connected with the rearing of lepidopterous larvae I 

 venture to offer some ideas upon breeding cages which I have 

 found useful. 



The problem of providing fresh food, fresh air and cleanli- 

 ness in a narrow enough space to avoid the risk of losing minute 

 and newly-hatched larvae presents itself to everyone undertaking 

 this sort of work. 



The style of breeding cage described in the text books is 

 expensive, bulky, and newly-hatched larvae are too easily lost 

 in it. 



Leaves of most plants will keep fresh for days in a tightly- 

 closed jelly tumbler or tin box, but the atmosphere in a tightly- 

 closed receptacle soon becomes foul, and larvae thus confined 

 are prone to disorders of the alimentary canal. 



Leaves placed in boxes or jars not airtight soon wither, so 

 that the larvae reject them. 



Leaves or twigs placed with their stems in a bottle of water 

 will keep fresh from a day to a week, according to the nature 

 of the foliage, and if the bottle be placed in a well-aired box 

 some of the important requirements are met, but larvae, espe- 

 cially when small, have a way of dropping off their food leaves, 

 and they are then very easily lost in a large breeding box. The 

 smooth sides of a glass bottle effectually prevent their return to 

 their food, even if they knew the way. The leaves and the 

 bottle of water are good, but they should be so arranged that 

 the larvae cannot get lost and can easily return to their food if 

 they fall from it. These conditions are all met by the apparatus 

 described below, which has the merits also of simplicity and 

 cheapness. 



Procure a tin dish about four inches in diameter and about 

 as deep (an empty tomato can does ver>' well, if one-third of 

 its upper end is cut off); an ordinary cylindrical Welsbach 

 gas chimney three and a half inches in diameter and four and 

 one-half inches high ; a small bottle three or four inches high. 



