178 Forty-first Report on the State Museum. 



Occurrence in a Hose-house. 

 The beautiful motli bearing the above name has long been known 

 as an ornament of entomological collections, while its larva has 

 seldom come under observation, and consequently little has been 

 written of its habits, The caterpillars have recently been discovered 

 as operating injuriously in a rose-house in Madison, N. J. Their work 

 had been conducted with secrecy, as during the day they rested 

 quietly on the stakes to which the roses were tied, selecting such as 

 resembled them in color so that they were scarcely observable; but at 

 night they became active, and resorting to the jDlants, fed upon the 

 buds, of which they consumed large numbers. The time of their 

 greatest injury was from October to January. Moths reared from 

 them, were sent for name, history, habits, etc. 



Habits and Natural History. 



The moths are a large and prettily marked species of the Noctuidce, 

 known as Homoptera lunata (Drury). 



The habit of the caterpillar of hiding on the stakes to which rose 

 bushes are tied, counterfeiting the color of the wood upon which it 

 rests, and leaving its retreat at night to feed upon the buds, has not 

 been previously recorded, and is quite interesting. It seems to feed 

 upon quite a number of greatly differing food-plants, as upon plum, 

 willow and majDle, according to Prof. French, and on oak, as stated by 

 Gruenee. Abbot, according to Guenee, has figured it in association 

 with a species of Hypericum. 



The eggs laid by the parent moth hatch in five days. There are 

 apparently two annual broods of moths. Eggs of the spring brood, 

 deposited April thirtieth, gave the moth at intervals between June 

 twentj^-first and July tenth, the average period for the change 

 into the perfect insect being sixty days. Of the autumnal brood, 

 larvae caj)tured abroad on willow and other bushes, have formed their 

 cocoons the last of September, and disclosed the moths early in 

 November; or wintered as pupse, and gave out the moth the following 

 spring. The above items in- the life-history of the insect are from a 

 paper by Prof. French, narrating its preparatory stages, in the 

 Canadian Entomologist for July, 1882, pp. 130-134. 



The Caterpillar. 



The caterpillars are described by Gruenee as whitish, shaded with 



gray, with a blackish dorsal and subdorsal interrupted lines. Upon 



the incisure, between the fourth and fifth rings, is a large yellowish 



spot, and on the back of the fourth, two blackish circles, inclosing 



