72 



NATURE STUDY AND LIFE 



Next let the members of the class provide themselves 

 with wide-mouthed bottles and hunt over every closet, 

 attic or storeroom, stable, poultry house, or woodshed 

 where scraps of hair, feathers, fur, or woolen cloth may have 

 gathered. Let them collect all the specimens both of larvae 

 and moths they can find and bring them to class in their 

 bottles. The lesson may then be devoted to distribution 



of clothes moths about the home. 

 Put a scrap of black woolen cloth 

 in each of the bottles containing 

 moths, cover the tops securely 

 with fine cotton gauze, and ask 

 the children to study their speci- 

 mens to see if they are all alike. 

 There are three clothes moths, 

 distinguished as follows : 



Tinea pellionella, common 



clothes moth, brown, with a few 



dark spots on fore wings ; larva constructs a case to live in. 



Ttneola biselliella, southern clothes moth, pale straw 



color without spots; larva spins silken webs, eats hair, 



feathers, furs, museum specimens, and cobwebs. 



Trichophaga tapetzella, tapestry moth, basal half of fore 

 wings black, the rest white; larva constructs burrows or 

 galleries in which it spins a silken lining. It generally 

 feeds on coarser fabrics, tapestries, carpets, skins, felt, 

 carriage upholsteries, etc. 



Continue study of specimens ; examine black cloths with 

 the aid of a hand lens for eggs, tiny white specks scarcely 

 visible to the naked eye ; select as many different stages 

 as possible and mount them permanently, as described in 



Fig. 28. Southern Clothes 



Moth 

 Moth, larva, cocoon, and empty 



pupa skin. (Enlarged, 



Riley) 



After 



