PSYCHIDES. Ill 



The pupal life of most (? all) Psychids is comparatively short. 

 Hybernation takes place in the larval stage and this, therefore, is the 

 most lengthened. Sunshine appears to be almost an absolute 

 necessity for emergence in some species, and almost all are active day- 

 flying insects. In the higher Psychids (at least), the males, after 

 emergence, mature very quickly and almost directly commence an 

 active search for the newly-emerged females. They assemble readily, 

 and appear to fly considerable distances. Fumea roboricolella will pair 

 with two different females in an hour (copulation only lasting about 

 four minutes) and the first occasion may take place within five minutes 

 of the emergence of the male from the pupa- case, so rapidly do the 

 wings expand, and the moths become active. Heylaerts notes that 

 " a male may copulate with one, two, or three females before dying, 

 the average life of a male Psychid not lasting more than two 

 days, whilst in captivity it sometimes lives for only a few hours, its 

 eagerness to find a female being such that it beats its wings 

 on the walls of the breeding- cage until it falls exhausted." Each 

 species has roughly a fixed time for the emergence of the imago. 

 Some emerge in the morning, others in the evening. The former 

 generally require the sun's rays to shine on them, for the latter this 

 is not necessary, although, as a rule, if one wishes to rear Psychids, 

 the cages in which they are kept should be placed out of doors summer 

 and winter. 



The male Psychids are variable in size, extending from the large 

 Oiketicus kirbii measuring sometimes 45mm. in expanse, to the small 

 Solenobiids, &c, which expand only 10-12mm. They are usually of 

 dull coloration — black, grey and whitish are the usual tints — whilst 

 some are transparent. A few exotic species of the Oiketicidae and 

 Animnlidae are less sombre in their tints. In the higher Psychids the 

 head is more or less strong, is very hairy, the antennae are bipectinated, 

 plumose, or crenulated. There are ocelli in Diplodoma, Bankesia and 

 Taleporia, but not in the higher families, the eyes are more or less large 

 and naked, and there are no palpi. In the place of the palpi are two 

 tubercles, each bearing a thick brush of longer or shorter, black or 

 brown hairs, called by Heylaerts the " pseudopalpes." The tongue 

 is entirely absent. The thorax is very hairy, the chitin beneath ivory- 

 black, or -brown, in colour ; the mesothorax is very wide, its scutellum 

 very large and round ; the metathorax, very narrow in the centre, 

 widens on either side, its scutellum is very small. The abdomen 

 normally -does not extend beyond the anal angle of the forewings, but 

 is able to be extended enormously in the males of those species that 

 pair with the females whilst the latter are in their cases, sometimes for 

 this purpose, increasing two or three times its normal length. The 

 abdominal segments, which are very hairy, are usually (always in tbe 

 higher Psychids) composed of very narrow rings of hard, dark, shiny 

 chitin, joined by a very extensile membrane. The generative organs 

 are corneous, very rudimentary, and do not carry the normal clasps. 

 The feet usually are not very long, the anterior, as a rule, longer than 

 the posterior (the genera Diabasis, Ejriclvnopteryx, Jlijui/is and Fumea 

 are exceptions). The shank, femur, and tibia are hairy, the tarsi 

 covered with very short down. The Oiketicidae, Payeliidae, and 

 most of the Epichnopterygidae have a spine, or epiphysis, " spina 

 tibialis," sometimes very long, on the anterior tibire. On the second 



