FAMILY HABITS IN BUTTERFLY LARVAE THE CHRYSOPHANIDS. Y 



larvae of Loweia amphidamas hybernate when less than half-grown, 

 and commence feeding again in the spring, being fullfed in late April 

 or early May. 



There is, however, some variation in the hybernating habit of the 

 Chrysophanids, for, although most hybernate as larvae, Heodes virgaureae 

 passes the winter in the egg-stage, but still as a larva, for the larva is 

 fully-formed in the eggshell, though it does not leave it till spring is 

 well-advanced. Cook found (Can. Ent., xl., pp. 85 et seg.) the Nearctic 

 Epidemia epixanthe ovipositing at the end of June, 1907, at Lake wood, 

 N.J., on Vaccinium macrocarpus, the eggs being laid chiefly on the 

 underside of the leaves ; he further notes that the eggs did not hatch 

 till the following spring, the insect hybernating in the egg- stage. 



Prideaux notes (Ent. Rec, xviii., p. 246) that a small batch of 

 larvae of Loweia alciphron (gordius) commenced to hybernate early 

 in November, 1905, with great unanimity. He further adds 

 (in litt.) that the larvae of Chrysophanus hippothoe hybernate 

 just as do those of L. gordius, attached to dead sorrel leaves, the 

 larvae of the two species appearing at this time, and also later, 

 almost indistinguishable to the naked eye, although the pupae are 

 very different. He says that the larvae of C. hippothoe, in con- 

 finement, huddle together on a dead or dying leaf for hyberna- 

 tion in a manner almost suggestive of a gregarious habit, but this is 

 probably owing to a common instinct for finding the driest or most 

 suitable accommodation that the breeding-cage affords. These green 

 larvae are, he adds, readily seen against a brown leaf, but the 

 latter is usually crumpled and curled round them, thus affording 

 concealment. Some larvae of Chrysophanus dispar [rutilus), reared 

 by Sich, hybernated in the third instar, laying up on August 14th, 

 1906, and remaining quiescent, though from time to time they 

 changed their position ; another lot of larvae which Chapman 

 was rearing commenced to hybernate on August 15th, 1906, each 

 larva spinning a silken pad on which to rest. He observes that one 

 larva sometimes left its pad, wandered for a day or two, and then returned, 

 but, on September 11th, it seemed to have finally settled down for hyber- 

 nation. These were both of the single- brooded race of the species taken 

 near Berlin. Yet another lot went into hybernation, according to 

 Frohawk, at the beginning of October, 1906 ; these were from second- 

 brood 5 s, the eggs having been laid in mid- August on both dock and 

 sorrel, the young larvae appearing at the end of that month and in 

 early September, thus showing a marked difference between the times 

 at which hybernation commences in " single- brooded " and " double- 

 brooded " areas. He further notes of these that, when examined in 

 December," those larvae that had hybernated on a living plant of 

 dock (with plenty of green leaves) were dead, whilst others that had 

 hybernated on a plant that had died down and only had brown 

 shrivelled leaves were alive and healthy, hybernating in the folds of 

 the damp dead leaves ; on February 27th some were still quiescent and 

 in their hybernating position, others, however, were crawling actively 

 about, and some were already on the undersides of the young freshly- 

 grown leaves. One suspects an error of observation in Frohawk's 

 note (Ent., xl., p. 178), that these larvae hybernated in the " second " (and 

 not the " third ") instar. The Nearctic Ghrysophanwi gorgon hybernates as 

 a small larva, from the end of October, when it is only about one-eighth 



