136 ENTOMOLOGICAL NEWS. [Mar., ’16 
ground. It even ran over the face and onto the lower side of the head. 
As I had frequently seen tiger beetles capture and devour ants, I fully 
expected that venturing about that part of the tiger beetle would be the 
end of the ant. But it was not; the beetle maintained its pose and the 
ant continued reconnoitering. 
My next thought was that the beetle must be dead, so in a leisure- 
ly careless way I stooped to pick it up. At the approach of my fingers 
it ran like a flash and I almost lost it. 
Having revolved in my mind several theories that might account for 
this behavior, I offer my favorite. That is, that being perfectly quiet 
and waiting for something to come within pouncing range is this tiger 
beetle’s way of hunting, and that having established itself on guard it 
was not to be swayed from its poise, even by what would seem most 
annoying attentions of the ant—W. L. McAtez, Washington, D. C. 
Vanessa californica and Frost (Lepid.). 
On November Ist, while pruning fruit trees in the upper Wenatchee 
Valley, I observed a Vanessa californica flying just above the tops of 
the young trees. The morning was quite frosty; in fact, the crust on 
the ground was thick enough to bear my weight; the sun was ob- 
scured by high-flying snow clouds, while a light but raw breeze off the 
snow fields of the Cascades made the feel of my heavy mackinaw coat 
very comfortable indeed. I was so surprised to meet with a butterfly 
under such conditions that I called to my brother-in-law, Mr. J. C. 
Hopfinger, who was working nearby, and together we watched it for 
some time. It was headed into the wind, but was not making any 
progress, and presently began to drift, but rising higher as it did so, 
finally disappeared from our sight. 
Its movements seemed rather sluggish,—not at all like the flight of 
californica in summer—and I kept expecting it to drop to the ground, 
but it did not do so, and at the last seemed to be flying more strongly 
than when I first observed it. 
This occurred near Leavenworth, Washington, in the higher foot- 
hills of the Cascades.—J. D. YANcEy, Port Columbia, Washington. 
Color Phases in Argynnis diana (Lep.). 
I note with interest in the January issue of the News, page 35, the 
query of Mr. W. C. Wood as to the color of his female specimen of 
A. diana, caught near here (Blacksburg, Virginia), in which specimen 
the basal two-thirds of the underside of the hind wings is dark, bluish- 
black instead of “dark, red-brown,” as described by Edwards. 
I first collected Argynnis diana near Asheville, North Carolina, in 
the summer of 1880, since which time I have collected it throughout 
its Alleghany range, particularly near Brevard, North Carolina, and 
Caesar’s Head, South Carolina, and for the past twenty-five years, 
here in Montgomery, Washington and Giles Counties, Virginia. 
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