S74f Short Commimications. 



two from those of them which have attained the growth and 

 feeding necessary to the condition of changing, and if the 

 moths should be determined, by the entomologist to whom I 

 may send them, to be not of the Triphae^na (A/octua) pro- 

 nuba, I will take some opportunity of stating the fact. If 

 they be grubs of the T. pronuba, they will prove that my 

 ascribing, in p. 504., to them a decided preference to the 

 plants of the order Cruciferse or class Tetradynamia, all which 

 have more or less of a mustard flavour, requires a slight qua- 

 lification. It deserves notice, however, that, if the grubs of 

 this moth feed also on onions, onions are still strong-flavoured 

 diet. — J.D. 



The Insect called the CucJcoospit {Aphrophora spummna). — 

 J. O. Westwood, Esq., in a communication to the Magazine 

 of Natural History fpr Sept. 1833 (No. xxxv.), on the affinities 

 and characteristics of an insect (Z)elphax saccharivora Westw.) 

 which ravages the herbage of the sugar cane (Saccharum offi- 

 cinarum L.), and which, he states, is related to the insect 

 called in Britain the cuckoo-spit, has given the following 

 remarks on this latter insect, which, we conceive, will be 

 worth being known by our gardening friends : — " Many 

 of your ^'eaders have, doubtless, often observed in the spring 

 a quantity of frothy matter upon various plants. This is 

 caused by an insect nearly allied to the Grenada pest, and 

 is commonly known by the name of the cuckoo-spit insect 

 (Aphrophora spumaria). In this instance the frothy matter 

 is nothing else but the sap of the plant which the insect has 

 pumped up into its stomach by its snout, and afterwards 

 ejected ; and we can easily conceive, if any plant were to be 

 attacked by myriads of this insect, how great would be the 

 damage which it would sustain ; the operations of this insect, 

 from the similarity in the structure of the mouth, being very 

 similar to those of the plant lice: and your readers are all 

 aware how exceedingly detrimental some species of the latter 

 genus ( A^phis) are in England ; one of them, A^phis humuli, 

 often occasioning damage as serious to the grower of the hop, 

 as the Grenada insect does to the planter of the sugar cane." 

 See the last Number (p. 443 — 445.) for a full account of the 

 effects on vegetation of the sap-sucking of the aphides, and of 

 their mode and course of performing it. On the insect called 

 the cuckoo-spit (Aphrophora spumaria) it may not be amiss to 

 remark, that the perfect insects may, in September, be seen, 

 devoid of all froth, and in coitu, on the surface of herbage, 

 in provision, doubtless, of eggs for the next year's generation. 

 When individuals not in coitu are met with, each skips off 

 with a jump on the slightest molestation. Where the eggs 



