10 REPORT 4, UNITED STATES ENTOMOLOGICAL COMMISSION. 



The habits of this moth can only be studied at night, as, like almost 

 all the rest of its family, it is nocturnal. During the day it simply starts 

 up when disturbed, and darts by swift and low flight to some other shel- 

 tered spot a few yards, or perhaps rods, away. After sunset, however, 

 it may be seen leisurely hovering about, either bent on the perpetua- 

 tion of its kind or feeding upon whatever sweets it can get, whether 

 from the cotton or from other sources. It is very strong and swift of 

 wing, and capable, when the necessity arises, of flying long distances. 

 In alighting upon the plant it generally turns its head downward, and, 

 when it rests, the wings are but shallowly roofed, the front ones closed 

 along the back and fully hiding the hind ones. In this respect it may 

 always be distinguished from the parent of the Boll Worm, which rests 

 with the front wings partly open and not entirely covering the hind 

 ones. 



The female begins to lay her eggs in from two to four days after issu- 

 ing from the chrysalis, the time varying with the different generations 

 and according to temperature. 



In experiments which we have made with moths confined in vivaria, 

 eggs have sometimes been laid thirty-six hours after issuing, and the 

 moths have continued laying for twenty-one nights, the number laid 

 each night ranging from 4 to 45, 



Examination of the ovaries of females at different seasons shows a 

 much greater prolificacy than belongs to most moths, as the number of 

 well- developed ova may reach 500, and of potential ova half as many 

 more. In confinement it is difficult to obtain from one female more than 

 300 eggs, but that fully double this number are produced in the field 

 during the height of the season there can be little doubt, while the aver- 

 age number may be estimated at about 400. 



The natural food of the moth, as we first indicated in the fall of 1878,* 

 is the sweet exudation from the glands upon the mid-rib of the leaf and 

 at the base of each lobe of the involucre of the cotton plant.^ Never- 

 theless it is attracted to all kinds of sweets, and in most parts of the 

 South it finds a bountiful supply in the exudation from the spikes of 

 Paspalum Iwve, a tolerably common grass, but particularly in that copi- 

 ously secreted by glands at the apex of the peduncle just above the pods 

 of the Oow-pea {Dolichos). In the spring of the year, as Judge Bailey, 

 of Marion, Ala., has observed, it may often be seen in the evening feed- 

 ing in numbers, first from the blossoms of the Ohicasaw plum, and sub- 

 sequently from those of the peach, Chinese quince, mock orange ( Cera- 

 8U8 carolinensis), the early apples, and blackthorn. Later in the sea- 

 son, when the glands above mentioned begin to exude and the tree 

 blossoms are no more, the moths do not seem to be attracted by other 

 nectar-storing flowers, since observations in different Southern States by 

 ourself and assistants have resulted in finding but one species of verbena 

 ( Verhena auhletia L.) frequented, even where both moths and all sorts of 



* See Atlanta (Ga.) Constitution September 20, and Scientific American November 15, 1878, 



