INSECTS MISTAKEN FOE ALETIA. 353 



tudes, as at Washington, aud Saint Louis, there are three generations, 

 tlie species hibernating both as hirva and imago, while in the South the 

 moths are* abundantly found during the winter months, and are fre- 

 quently mistaken for Aletia. The species will be readily recognized 

 from the accompanying figures (Plate LXII, Fig. 5e,/), which sliow, also, 

 the variation which we have obtained from the same batch of larvae. 

 AVe first reared this species from the larva in 1871^, and have frequently 

 obtained eggs laid in confinement by captured females. They are de- 

 posited on grass leaves and upon the surface of the ground in the breed- 

 ing cages, as well as upon the muslin covering the smaller breeding 

 jars. One female was observed to deposit 112 eggs. The newly hatched 

 larvae are pale greenish-yellow in color and are very active, moving with 

 a looping gait. The full grown larvae are grayish-yellow, marked with 

 two broad, blackish, somewhat interrupted dorsal stripes. They are 

 described by William Saunders in the Canadian Entomologist for June, 

 1875. Of the eggs and pupae, which have not previously been carefully 

 described, we submit descriptions in the notes.* ^^ 



Laphygma frugiperda (Abbot and Smith). 

 [Plate LXII, Fig. 2.] 



The larva of this insect is commonly known throughout the South as 

 the ^' Grass Worm," and although usually noticed in moderate numbers 

 eating out the wild gra^s between cotton rows and elsewhere, and so 

 doing good rather than harm, still there occur at irregular intervals 

 seasons in which it appears in enormous numbers, eats out the grass, 

 "rags" the cotton, eats the corn leaves, and utterly destroys the crops 

 of the vegetable gardens over more or less extended parts of the country. 

 These destructive appearances usually occur late in the summer or in 

 the faM, aud for this reason in our Third Missouri Eeport we gave it the 

 title of the " Fall Army Worm," describing it under the scientific name 

 of Prodenia atdumnalis^ with two of its more marked varieties, obscura 

 (Plate LXII; Fig. 2c) and fulvosa (Plate LXII; Fig. 26). The larva is 

 figured in the Missouri report just alluded to aud in our annual report 

 as U. S. Entomologist for 1881-^82 (Plate VII; Fig. 4). 



Although the great majority of planters distinguish between the 

 *' Grass Worm " and the "Cotton Worm," yet it is owing to a mistaking 

 of the former for the latter that many accounts of a diversity of food- 

 habit on the i^art of Aletia have been published. The two insects are 

 quite dissimilar in appearance, and in habit still more so. The Grass 

 Worm transforms to a naked pupa beneath the surface of the ground, 

 and hi\)ernates in this condition. 



* Since this was written, Prof. G. H. French has published (Papilio, Vol. IV, Nos.7 

 and 8, Septeinher-October, 1884, p. 148) lengthy descriptions of all of the preparatory 

 sta/tes of this species. • 



03 CONG 23 



