i6 



Indian Museum Notes. [ Vol. V. 



I am disposed to think the beetles were flying over the garden, and dropped 

 down on different parts of it, and ate the tea leaves, but found they were not 

 to their liking, and so did not eat them a second time. 



Note.-The garden is in its 4 th year. Jat of plant is Munipuri indigenous. 

 Open garden free of tree jungle. Elevation about 1,800 feet at base of Bhutan 

 Hills. 



Heterusia cingala, Moore. 

 (Sub-order Heterocera, Fam. Zygaenidse.) 



Heterusia cingala, Moore, An. Nat. His. 1877, p. 343 ; id. 



Lep. Ceyl. ii, p. 41, pi. 96, fig. 1; 

 C. & S. No. 391; Hamp. Faun 

 B. Ind. Bur. Ceyl. Moths. I, p. 262. 



In March 1898 Messrs. Davenport & Co. forwarded to the Indian 

 Museum specimens of a caterpillar said to be devastating some of their 

 new extensions in the Darjeeling Tea Estates. 



The insects proved to be the larvae of an unknown Zygaenid moth. 

 However, some of the caterpillars that appeared to be alive were 

 enclosed in a breeding cage where they very readily pupated. This 

 looked like obtaining a moth for further identification. But instead 

 of moths, numerous Tachinid flies emerged from the cocoons, which 

 on examination were found to be so thoroughly parasitized by the 

 flies that out of a dozen cocoons not a single moth was reared ; each 

 cocoon harbouring as many as ten pupae of the fly. 



On submitting specimens of the fly to Mr. Coquillett for examina- 

 tion, he identified it as the species he had some time ago described 

 and named Exorista heterusia?, a Tachinid parasite which had been 

 bred from a tea pest Heterusia cingala by Mr. E. E. Green in Ceylon, 

 the description of the fly appearing in Indian Museum Notes, Vol. 

 IV, No. v, p. 279. 



From the identity of the parasite and the similarity of its life- 

 history with that of the species observed by Mr. Green, it was in- 

 ferred that the caterpillar- host might also, probably, be identical 

 with the Ceylon species, and this on examination proved to be the case 

 — the larvae and cocoons forwarded by Messrs. Davenport & Co., being 

 identical with the larvae and cocoons of Heterusia cingala, Moore 

 presented to the Museum by Mr. Green. 



