184 LEPIDOPTERA (MOTHS). 



destructive. After the crop has been taken, it is a good plan to 

 turn a number of fowls on the land, as they devour these larvae 

 greedily. Watering around plants where the grubs are plentiful 

 with paraffin emulsion has a good effect ; but for wholesale 

 purposes there is nothing like a dry dressing of soot and lime. 



The PluniadcB or Y-jNIoths include one destructive species — 

 namely, the Silvery Y {Pliisia gamma) (fig. 84), which now and 

 then feeds upon turnips and clover. The larvae have only 

 two pairs of prolegs in the middle of the body, and in P. 

 gamma are green in colour, with a white streak down the 



Fig, S4.— Silvery T-Moth (Plusia gamma). 

 I, Ova ; 3, larva ; 3, pupa ; 4, imago. (Curtis.) 



back and a yellow one on each side. The Plusiadte spin a 

 light silken cocoon (3). Among the Arronijctuhi' we find a 

 fruit pest, the Figure-of-eiglit Jfoth (Di'loha ircruhocephdc^, 

 sometimes sufficiently abundant to damage the leafage of the 

 apple, but usually feeding on hawthorn. 



Geometrina. — The Geometers are characterised by the 

 peculiar mode of progress in their larvre, which have only 

 ten or fourteen legs ; the prolegs are never all developed. 

 Very few have twelve legs, fewer still are provided with 

 fourteen. They move in a series of " loops," arching the 



