52 NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 



1900 Smith, J. B. Amer. Ent. Soc. Trans. 27:35-36. 



1904 Pettit, R. H. Mich. Agric. Exp't Sta. Spec. Bui. 24, p. 28-29. 



1905 Felt, E. P. N. Y. State Mus. Mem. 8, 1:129-32. 

 1911 N. Y. State Mus. Bui. 147, p. 6-7. 



IRIS BORER 

 Macronoctud onusta Grote 



Specimens of this boring caterpillar were received July 25, 

 191 1 from Mr Waldo L. Rich of Saratoga Springs, N. Y., 

 accompanied by the statement that about half of the Iris tubers 

 in a bed were partly eaten by a grub. Mr J. W. Huyck also 

 transmitted specimens from Saratoga about the same time and 

 stated that these borers had practically destroyed a bed of Iris 

 roots. He found over one hundred of the caterpillars in a bed 

 about 6x8 feet long. 



This species appears to have largely escaped the observation 

 of economic entomologists. It was first reared from Iris by Doctor 

 Thaxter. Henry Bird records in 1902, injury by this larva to 

 Iris roots, and in a recent letter states that this insect is at 

 times obnoxious in parks and on estates where large beds of 

 Iris are used for landscape effect. The late Dr James Fletcher 

 mentions several instances of injury in Canada in a report for the 

 same year, while the following season Arthur Gibson gives a 

 somewhat detailed note respecting the* operations of this borer. 

 Dr J. B. Smith also records injury by this insect. 



Description. The parent moth (plate 17, figure 3) has a wing 

 spread of about one and seven-eighths inches and is a typical 

 Noctuid in form and color. The forewings are a variable dark 

 purplish brown with a more or less distinct, broadly crenulate 

 and dentate (the latter near the middle) subterminal line. The 

 discal spot is very irregular, being narrowly lanceolate, with 

 an indistinct, rounded, lobelike projection anteriorly. Near the 

 basal third and a little behind the anterior margin there is an 

 irregularly subtriangular area bounded by a narrow line of dark 

 scales. Posterior of this there is a faintly outlined, oval area 

 resting upon a somewhat more distinct, curved line of dark 

 scales, and near the posterior margin a somewhat indistinct, V- 

 shaped mark of similar scales. The anterior third of the wing 

 back to the middle, and the distal fifth especially on the posterior 

 two-thirds, is markedly darker, the margin with a distinct 



