THE BOLL WORM CHARACTERS AND TRANSFORMATIONS. 87 I 



ings had been normal. (See, also, report of Judge Lawrence C. John- 

 son, Eep. Ent., Depi. Ag., 1881-'82, p. 150.) The length of time which 

 Heliothis remains in the pupa state in the cotton fields in midsummer 

 varies from seven to t€n days. In spring and in fall the time may 

 lengthen to fifteen, twenty, or even more. Ordinarily the insect goes 

 on propagating till frost, but occasional instances are met with where a 

 pupa will remain quiescent from early in September, and even in August, 

 on through the winter. 

 The pupa may be described as follows : 



Length, 20™™ (0.8 incli) ; color, light mahogany brown, darker toward head. Head 

 covered with small, faint granulations and with a few shallow transverse impressed 

 lines anteriorly ; also a few irregular impressions behind the eye ; about midway from 

 the posterior angle of the eye and the posterior border of the head is an impressed 

 puncture, from which a short, stiff hair arises ; there is also another shallow trian- 

 gular impression on the medio-dorsal line near the posterior border of the head. The 

 whole dorsal surface of the thoracic joints is finely punctate, and is covered with irreg- 

 ular, shallow, impressed, transverse lines ; the metathoracic joint is much wrinkled 

 dorsally. The surface of the abdominal joints is similarly sculptured ; the anterior 

 margins of joints 4 to 7 are coarsely punctured ; joint 4 has but few punctures, but on 

 5, 6 and 7 they are numerous ; the more anterior of these punctures are deep, and they 

 extend posteriorly into long, shallow, longitudinal impressions ; the posterior dorsal 

 margins of each of these joints are covered with dark-brown granulations of differing 

 forms. The other joints, except the last, have nothing xjeculiar in their structure ; 

 the last joint is rounded and furnished at the tip with two long, slender, black spines. 

 Ventrally the last and the penultimate joints have each a deep longitudinal medial 

 impressed line. Wing, leg and antennal cases covered with shallow punctures. 



The imago (Plate III, Figs. 7, 8, 9). — As w^e have already stated, 

 Heliothis armigera is an extremely variable species, as would naturally 

 be expected from its multitudinous food-plants and its almost unlimited 

 distribution. 



In general color the moths vary from a dull ocher-yellow to a dull 

 olive-green. The two extremes are well shown upon the plate at fig- 

 ures 7 and 8. In these figures the normal type of markings is also 

 shown, but in this respect, also, there is great variation. Many individ- 

 uals exhibit almost immaculate front wings, while in others the typical 

 markings are deepened far more than in the figures. In a general expe- 

 rience covering some twenty years with this moth, as found in corn-fields 

 in the West, and covering some half-dozen years in the cotton-fields of 

 the South, we believe that the former are on an average brighter col- 

 ored and darker than the latter. The markings of the hind wings, al- 

 though much more constant than those of the fore wings, vary princi- 

 pally in the breadth and depth of color of the dusky band on the hinder 

 margin, and in the size of the light spots within this band. With the 

 figures, and the description already quoted (p. 358) of the form called 

 umbrosus no more extended popular characterization of the moth will 

 be necessary. 



The position of the moth when at rest is characteristic, or at least 

 distinguishes it radically from Aletia. The latter, it will be remembered, 



