46 



NATURE STUDY 



' Breeding cages" can be made iu 

 various ways. One of the most gen- 

 erally useful consists of a flower-pot 

 in which the food plant of the insect to 

 be bred is growing. The plant should 

 be inclosed by a lantern globe or wide 

 lamp chimney whose top is covered 

 over with mopquito netting (fig. 23). 

 If the food plant cannot be grown in 

 the pot (if for example it is some shrub 

 or tree) the flower-pot may be filled with 

 wet sand, or better, a wide-mouthed 

 bottle filled with the wet sand and .sunk 

 into the soil in the flower-pot, and leaf- 

 covered branches be stuck into the sand. 

 Fig. 23. Lamp^^imney ^^d Tbe food shouM be renewed as oftcn as 



flower-pot breeding cnK-e. necessarv 



Professor Comstock recommends a cage made by fitting a 

 pane of glass into one side of an empty soap-box. A board, 

 three or four inches wide, should be fastened below the glass so 

 that a layer of soil may be placed in the lower part of the cage, 

 and the glass shonld be fitted so that it may slide and thus serve 

 as a door (fig. 24). 



Many caterpillars when ready to pupate burrow into the 

 soil, and transform underground. For this reason it is neces- 

 sary to have a layer of soil in the flower- pot cage or the boxcage if 

 such caterpillars or other larvae of similar habit are being bred. 

 After the caterpillars have gone into the soil to pupate, they may 

 be dug for and the pupae found and examined. The pupae should be 

 buried again, and the issuance of the moth or butterfly (or other 

 insect) be awaited. 



Cocoons may be kept suspended by strings in wooden boxes. 

 The interior of the box should contain a little soil which should 



