[55] 



Report of the State Entomologist. 



197 



Its Food-plants. 



The caterpillar was believed to feed exclusively on the different 

 species of oak, until recently, when Mrs. A. K. Dimmock, of Cambridge, 

 Mass., has added white birch (Betula alba) to its short list of food- 

 plants. To what extent it was observed to feed thereon is not stated 

 (see loo. cit.). Messrs. "Walsh-Kiley have recorded an instance in which 

 the eggs of the moth were laid on raspberry leaves (Amer. Entomol, 

 ii, 1869, p. 26), but it was probably under the constraint of inability 

 to reach an oak for oviposition, and it is doubtful if the larvae when 

 hatched would have fed on the raspberry. 



Dr. Harris states that in Massachusetts they live on the white and 

 red oaks [Queivus alba and Q. rubra]. Professor Claypole observed the 

 white oak to be untouched by them at New Bloomfield, Pa., and their 

 food to be almost exclusively the foliage of the black-oak (Quercus 

 tinctoria), the scarlet-oak (Q. coccinea), and the bear or scrub-oak (Q. 

 ilicifolia). In my own observations at Center, they have usually 

 occurred on the dwarf chestnut-oak (Q. prinoides) and on the black 

 scrub-oak (Q. ilicifolia). 



Its Distribution. 



Although originally described from specimens collected in Georgia, 

 it is far less abundant in the southern States than in the northern.* 

 Its eastern range is apparently from Canada to Georgia. To the 

 westward it is reported in published lists from Wisconsin (Walsh), 

 Missouri (Kiley), Kansas (rare, Snow), and California. 



It seems to be rather a local insect. Dr. Fitch mentions the fact 

 that he had never met with it at Salem, Washington county, where he 

 resided, while it was very abundant only twenty-five miles distant. 

 In my collections, extending over many years, it has never been seen 

 by me in abundance in any other locality than at Center. 



Stinging Powers. 



This caterpillar is another of the few that are capable of inflicting 

 a sting when handled. It is not as severe, however, as those of the 

 Cochlidice. According to Dr. Fitch, its prickles, if they happen to pene- 

 trate the skin, produce a stinging sensation like that of nettles and a 

 slight redness of the spot ; both these symptoms, however, lasting 

 but a short time, as in the case of nettle stings. 



It is not included in the list of stinging larva by Prof. Riley, referred 

 to on page 185, although mention is there made of the sting of Anisota 

 stigma, on the authority of Dr. Fitch. 



*Prof. Geo. F. Atkinson, entomologist of the South Carolina Agricultural Experiment 

 Station, at Columbia, represents this species as by far the most common Anisota in 

 middle North Carolina. A. rubiounda is there frequently met with in broods on the maple, 

 and twice he had found broods of A. stigma (Bull. No. 4, Jan., 1889, So. Car. Agr. Exper. 

 St., pp. 87-8.) 



