HAY- STACK MOTH. 15 



The followiiag note of presence of infestation of the Httle Pyralis 

 moth (figured p. 14) in the outer part of some fodder stacks, especially 

 Clover and Saintfoin, near Canterbury, is given, because, though it 

 has not been reported as doing much mischief, yet where the white 

 cocoons of the chrysalis occur to any noticeable amount, a scare 

 sometimes arises as to the quality of the hay being injured. 



"Whether there is reason for this does not appear, but, in Canada 

 and also in many of the United States, "^^ much harm is at times caused 

 to Clover-hay, which has stood for some years, by infestation of the 

 caterpillar of a very nearly-allied species of Pyralis moth, which is 

 sometimes taken here (that is, in England) round stacks, and which is 

 scientifically known as the Pyralis or Asopla costalis, more popularly as 

 the " Gold-fringe." In America it is popularly known as the Clover- 

 hay Moth or Worm ; therefore, as our P. ylaucinalis appears to be at 

 present without a convenient appellation for common use, I have 

 ventured to suggest the above term of "Hay-stack Moth," as indicating 

 one of its most important localities. 



On the 7th of June, Mr. W. Gardner, writing from Bekesbourne, 

 near Canterbury, forwarded me some bunches of the white, flattish-oval 

 cocoons of these moths, spun up with rubbish of the dry material 

 amongst which the caterpillars had fed, and the observation: — "I took 

 them from the outsides of a Saintfoin-stack that has been standing 

 here three years. I never remember to have seen anything of the 

 kind before, and when we cut the stack out, which will I hope be 

 shortly, I shall look and see if it is only on the outside they are very 

 numerous." 



The cocoons, of which a good many were successively sent me by 

 Mr. Gardner, were pure white, of a filmy material, like rather flocculent 

 silver paper, and transparent enough to show the shape of the contents 

 when held against the light. The individual cocoons were in shape 

 much like a melon or gourd-seed (see figure), about half an inch in 

 length, rather less than a quarter of an inch in breadth, and rather 

 more than an eighth of an inch in thickness. The two convex sides 

 met, like a melon-seed, at an obtuse edge, and at the extremities were 

 bluntly rounded ; one end remained unaltered, the other split open 

 from side to side (to allow the exit of the moth), with such a perfectly 

 straight separation that it seemed doubtful whether this part had been 

 more than just lightly closed. At first the cocoons were very perfect 

 in form, and pure in whitness ; with the escape of the moth they sunk 

 in irregularly. 



The contained chrysalids were of a chestnut-brown colour and 



* See paper on "Insects Injurious to Clover," by Prof. William Saunders, in 

 Annual Keport of the Entomological Society of Ontario, for 1881, p. 45. 



