VI HETEROCERA THYRIDIDAE — LASIOCAMPIDAE 405 



Insects, and contain no very striking forms. Some of them 

 look like Geometrids of various groups. The family is v^idely 

 distributed in the tropical zone, and includes 25 genera, of 

 which Blbodoneura, with upwards of 100 species, is the chief 

 oue. The larvae are said to be similar to those of Pyralidae. 

 This family is considered by Hampson and Meyrick to be 

 ancestral to butterflies.-' 



Fam. 29. Lasiocampidae {Eggers, Lappet -vioths). — Usually 

 large Insects densely covered with scales, without frenulum, 

 but with the costal area of the hind wing largely developed, 

 and the male antennae beautifully pectinate, Lasiocampids are 

 easily recognised. They are well known in Britain, though we 

 have but few species. The flight of some of the species is 

 powerful, but ill-directed, and the males especially, dash about 

 as if their flight were quite 

 undirected ; as indeed it 

 probably is. The differ- 

 ence in the flight of the 

 two sexes is great in some 

 species. In the genus 

 Suana and its allies we meet 

 with moths in which the 



difference in size of the Fig. 201. ^Lappet-moth, Gastroxiacha guerci- 

 , ■ i i-u folia, 9. Britain. 



two sexes is extreme ; the 



males may be but 1-|- inches across the wings, while the very 

 heavy females may have three times as great an expanse. Kirby 

 separates these Insects to form the family Piuaridae ; it in- 

 cludes the Madagascar silkworm, Borocera madagascariensis. 

 The African genus Hilhrides is remarkable for the wings being 

 destitute of scales, and consec|uently transparent, and for being of 

 very slender form like a butterfly. The eggs of Lasiocampidae 

 are smooth, in certain cases spotted in an irregular manner like 

 birds' eggs. Sometimes the parent covers them with hair. 

 The larvae are clothed with a soft, woolly hair, as well as with a 

 shorter and stiffer kind, neither beautifully arranged nor highly 

 coloured, and thus differing from the caterpillars of Lyman- 

 triidae ; this hair in some cases has very irritating pro- 

 perties. Cocoons of a close and compact nature are formed, and 

 hairs from the body are frequently mixed with the cocoon. In 



' Revision of the Thyrididae ; Hampson, P. Zool. Soc. London, 1897, p. 603. 



