BULLETIN OF THE BROOKLYN BNT. SOC. 83 



Notes on Deiopeia bella, Linn. 



Deiopeia bella. Linn, was in my experience always an extreme- 

 ly local species. Sometimes in my rambles, one would start up 

 before me, and by search in the vicinity I would generally secure 

 a dozen or more ; while perhaps not another would be met during 

 the season. Last September I had excellent evidence of the local 

 tendency of this species, or at least of the fact that it is not often 

 found far from its food plant. 



A friend reported that by accident he had found a place where 

 the moth was plentiful ; we went together to the place the next 

 .day ; it was an artificial depression, fla" on "the bottom, about 300 

 by 150 feet in extent, and with steep banks 6 to 10 feet in hight, 

 and was part of an uuused grass field. The place was alive with 

 the beautiful moth, they rose before the feet of one walking in 

 swarms. / 



A dozen might have been taken with one sweep of the net. 

 But outside of this depression, hardly a moth was found, and 

 those very near by it, The ground was thickly covered with the 

 food plant, the common rattle box, Crotalaria sagittalis, Linn. ; 

 and the seed vessels, almost without exception, showed a circular 

 hole in the side, the work of the larva of the moth. 



Some interesting varieties were taken. A few of the bright 

 red form D. speciosa, Walk, a few others as light as D. oruatix 

 Linn, and many varied greatly as to the amount of black on both 

 upper and lower wings, some having almost none. 



The record leads us to believe in the suggestion of Mr. Stretch 

 that bella, speciosa, and ornatrix, are nothing more than vari- 

 eties of the same species. 



GEO. D. HUL5T. 



In Mr. Graef's article on the Pupa of SAMIA GLOVERI he 

 states that a friend who had raised this species from the egg as- 

 sures him the larva is totally unlike that of CECROPIA. I would 

 merely mention in connection with the above that the larva has 

 been fully described and the points of difference between it ami 

 the allied species, COLUMBIA, CECROPIA. and CEANOTHI 

 noted in detail in the 2d vol. of the Proc. of the Davenport 

 Acad, of Nat. Sc. p. 276-278. (1878) Herman strecker. 



