Notes on the Genus Coleophora. 



By Alfred Sich, F.E.S. Read February nth, 1904. 



To the fifteenth volume of the " Entomologist's Record " our 

 worthy Secretary, Mr. Henry J. Turner, contributes a valuable paper 

 on the Coleophorids. 



On page 88 he writes : " I know there are other lepidopterists 

 equally interested in the group, and possibly some mutual help with 

 material, and a checking of observations made, ought to be arranged, 

 so that an advance in our knowledge of the group might be 

 chronicled." 



During the past season I have endeavoured to qualify myself, so 

 that I might be accounted worthy to be reckoned among the "other 

 lepidopterists," and with this end in view I beg leave to bring forward 

 these rough notes. 



I propose, firstly, to give an outline life history of Coleophora 

 fuscedinella ; secondly, a few remarks on the Coleophorid case ; and, 

 thirdly, some notes on the Coleophorid larva. 



Coleophora fuscedinella, Zeller. 



The female moth, flying around the food-plant at dusk, alights on 

 the underside of a leaf, near the apex. She walks down the centre 

 of the leaf, feeling the surface with the ovipositor as she proceeds. 



By this method, sooner or later, she will find the angle formed by 

 the midrib and a lateral rib, the two ribs forming an obstruction to 

 the ovipositor in its course. Having thus found the angle, she 

 adjusts her position so that by curving the abdomen under her the 

 ovipositor is brought parallel with the surface of the leaf. It is then 

 thrust well into the angle, among the long hairs, springing from the 

 ribs, and the egg is laid. Occasionally more than one egg will be 

 laid in the same angle, but not often more than two. In a confined 

 space the moth, like other moths, will lay large batches of eggs on 

 leaves or in niches of cork, or even on a smooth surface such as 

 glass. I believe, however, in freedom that one only, or two ova 

 generally squeezed together, to be the usual number. With regard 

 to the total number of ova which one C. fuscedinella is capable of 

 laying, I do not think it can be very large. One female laid fifty-one 

 eggs before I let her fly, but I do not think she had then parted with 

 all her ova, though probably with the greater prooortion. 



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