THE BRITISH NATURALIST. 



[August 



obtained, thanks to my friend Mr. Harrison of Barnsley, a few ova of 

 Arctia lubricipeda var. radiata, Curtis : both 6 and Q parents being from 

 true radiata type and every one I bred this year came true to heredity, 

 varying in intensity, still all radiata type. The extraordinary weather 

 of April saw all up and a pairing gave me ova, which duly hatched 

 and fed up in May and early June, and by July the 8th imagines 

 appeared again in my cages, and up to date, July 18th, several grand 

 examples have emerged. All again are true to type. Three or four 

 are almost black, only three small intercellular streaks being cream 

 colour. The under-wing entirely black, relieved only by the fine 

 yellow lines of the nerves of the wing and with black fringes ; truly 

 grand vars. A great point of interest is the remarkable manner in 

 which the offspring have followed the variation of the parents, and 

 does it not indicate that heredity is the great factor in producing local 

 races. Side by side with this small brood of radiata, I had several 

 hundred pupae reared last year from' ova of selected Yorkshire parents, 

 but of a totally different style of variation, in these latter the character 

 was to form a strong central fascia of the Noctua pattern and from 

 my many pupa of this form, I have bred, indeed, a grand series. 

 These vary down to normal southern type but the picked forms are a 

 wonderful lot, but totally differing from radiata. I selected one of the 

 strongest marked banded form 2, and this was paired with a radiata 6. 

 The larva from this cross are now feeding, and I shall watch with 

 much interest the emergence of these imagines to see if there is any 

 blending of the two distinct forms. 



Besides the vars. of lubricipeda, through the kindness of my friend, 

 Mr. C. Fenn, I had the pleasure of breeding some grand varieties of 

 P. monacha. These are part of the brood that Mr. -Fenn has been 

 m-breeding and by selection, hoping to obtain an entirely black form, and 

 that, I expect he has done, as from my small series, some are almost 

 so, in fact, you might well call them black. 

 6, Lewisham Road, Greenwich. 



SUGARING. 



As numbers of the forms for recording the results of " Sugaring " 

 have come to hand, it becomes necessary that I must lay some of the 

 details before my readers. Had the problem been one that proved 

 easy of solution, it might have been well, only to print such items as 

 were necessary to explain the solution. But as this has not been so, 

 as, in fact, only negative results can be shown so far, the better way 

 will be to publish a selection of the reports. This, therefore, I proceed 



