124 FIFTH REPORT OF THE ENTOMOLOGICAL COMMISSION. 
168. The oraxge->triiki> oak-worm." 
An 'mot a ainatonu Hiibner. 
Order Lepidoptera: family Bombycid.k. 
In August, sometimes stripping the trees, a spiny black caterpillar, with four orange- 
yt'llow vtoipef «>n the book and two along each side, with two black prickles above 
and two on each side, changing the following June to a large ocher-yellow moth, 
with a large white dot on the fore wings. 
These prickly caterpillars, during certain years, as I have noticed at 
Amherst, Mass., and at Providence, as well as in Maine, so abound as 
to nearly strip large oak branches of their leaves, and is perhaps the 
most destructive of all our caterpillars to the foliage of the oak. The 
spines, if they happen to penetrate the skin, as Fitch and others have 
observed, sting like nettles. This species, Mr. Riley informs me, is the 
more injurious in the Northern States, while A, stigma is most destruct- 
ive in the Southern. According to Riley, Mr. Bassett has bred a small 
ichneumon fly (Limner ia [Bancnus] fugitiva Say) from this caterpillar. 
Riley has also bred it from the larva of Anisota stigma, Clisiocampa 
sylvatica, as well as other caterpillars. 
Mr. Lintner states that "the larvaB occur so abundantly at Center as 
wholly to defoliate numbers of the smaller oaks. On the 7th of July 
the female moths were seen to have commenced the deposition of their 
eggs on the under side of oak leaves in patches often nearly covering 
the entire surface. On the 11th of July some newly hatched larvae 
were observed." (Eut. Contr., i, 5S, foot-note 1.) 
In 1882 this caterpillar was very destructive to oak forests in Penn- 
sylvania. Professor Claypole writes to the Canadian Entomologist 
(xv, 38): 
I have seen hillsides that looked as if fire had passed over them in consequence of 
the destruction of the foliage by millions of this species. Iu the woods they could be 
found crawling over almost every square foot of ground and lying dead by dozens 
in every pool of water. The sound of their falling ''frass," too, was like a slight 
shower of rain. Farmers tell me they have never known them to be so abundant before 
within their recollection. Harris says this species lives on the white and red oaks in 
* Anisota senatoria Abb. & Smith (Nat. Hist. Lepid. Ins. Ga., 1797, v. 2, p. 113, pi. 
57). Harris (Rept. Ins. Injur. Veg., 1841, p. 291-29*2) describes the larva, pupa, and 
imago of this species; the larva, he states, feeds upon white and red oaks [Quercw 
sp.]. Morris (Synop. Lepid. X. A., 1862, p. 231) describes the larva and imago. Har- 
ris (Treatise on Ins. Injur. Veg., 1662, p. 405-406) figures and describes larva, pupa, aud 
imago, and (Entom. Corresp., 1869. p. 896, pL 2, fig. 9, and pi. 4, fig. 12) gives a col- 
ored figure of the larva and a black one of the pupa. Riley [?] (Amer. Entom., Sept.- 
Oct., 1669, v. 2, p. 26) states that the larra eats raspberry [Rubus sp.]. Lintner 
(Entom. Contrib., No. 2. 1672, p. 51-52) describes the early stages of the larva, which, 
he writes, has four molts (five stages), and feeds on Qucrcu* prinoides. Packard 
( Bull. 7, U. S. Entom. Comm., 1881, p. 45) briefly describes the larva, and gives a few 
notes upon its habits. The larva feeds on Betula alia. (Mrs. Dimmock, Psyche, 
iv. 275.) 
