THE 



British Naturalist. 



VOL. II. 



WICKEN FEN AND DISTRICT IN 1891. 



G. T. PORRITT, F.L.S., F.E.S. 



For many years Wicken Fen has been one of my favourite 

 collecting localities, and during the last thirteen years 1 have probably 

 made more Entomological expeditions to it than to any other locality. 

 I was there this year from August 5th to 19th, and a few gossipy notes 

 on the outing may perhaps be not altogether uninteresting to the 

 readers of the " British Naturalist." On my arrival I found that 

 Mr. J. W. Tutt, of London, had already been doing good work there 

 for more than a week ; and the enthusiastic local collectors Messrs. 

 Albert Houghton and Solomon Bailey had been busy among the Fen 

 specialities for some time. As at Askham Bogs this season, Col! is 

 spavsata had been out in unusual abundance ; in both these wddely 

 separated localities it has occurred in profusion this year, and was con- 

 stantly getting into our nets almost quite up to the end of our stay at 

 Wicken, though the specimens were then of course, all very much 

 worn. The beautiful Nascia cilialis too had been abundant, and odd 

 ones were still coming to the lamps at night ; and even Meliann 

 fiamtnea and Macrogastev ariindinis were barely over. M . aniiidinis is 

 now however much more plentiful in the Chippenham than the 

 Wicken Fen. Chippenham Fen is some four or five miles from 

 Wicken and very different in many respects in its character, being 

 interspersed and surrounded with small woods and plantations ; 

 whereas Wicken Fen has only a comparatively few scattered bushes 

 upon it. The fen herbage too varies a good deal in the two fens. At 

 Chippenham this year, Mr. Farren, of Cambridge took some forty to 

 fifty M. arundinis in two nights, whereas at Wicken, in the same 

 time six or eight specimens would have been considered a good 

 take. Chippenham too is the fen where Plusici orichalcea has 

 been taken so freely of late years, and seemed to have been as 



