22 REPORT 4, UNITED STATES ENTOMOLOGICAL COMMISSION. 
To sum up the evidence from present knowledge : Aletia never hiber- 
nates in either of the lirst three states of egg, larva, or chrysalis, and it 
survives the winter in the moth or imago state only in the southern por- 
tion of the cotton belt. Our own investigations since 1878 in every cot- 
ton-growing State in the Union, together with the experience and testi- 
mony of both correspondents and special agents employed in the inves- 
tigation, confirmed us in these conclusions, and we were consequently 
perfectly prepared for their justification by the facts obtained during the 
winter of 1881-82. During this winter we were able to obtain the moths 
during every month, and watched them in fact until the early part of 
March. In short, there is nothing more fully established now than that 
the moth hibernates principally under the shelter of rank wire-grass 
iu the more heavily timbered portions of the South, and that these 
moths begin laying on the rattoon cotton when this is only one inch or 
so high.* 
1. It is quite certain that by far the larger portion of the moths from 
the last brood of worms perish in various ways without perpetuating 
the species. All those which fly north of the cotton belt must needs 
thus perish, as doubtless do all those that attempt to hibernate in the 
northern portion of said belt. The evidence is strong that even in the 
hibernating portion of the belt only the exceptional few, more favored 
than the rest and remaining steadily torpid till early spring, survive to 
beget progeny. Tho?e which are aroused to activity during the mild 
winter weather spend their force without finding compensating nourish- 
ment, as there are neither fruits, flowers, nor sweet-secreting glands at 
that season wherewith to break their long fast and sustain vitality. It 
is for these reasons that the worms are generally less injurious after 
mild and changeable winters, and most to be dreaded after severe and 
steady ones, and it may very justly be argued, that did the larger pro- 
portion of the moths survive, there would be no chance to grow cotton. 
Like perishing of the bulk of most insects that hibernate above ground 
is, in fact, an acknowledged rule in entomology. 
2. The localities where Aletia doubtless hibernates, and where, conse- 
quently, the earliest worms appear, seem to be more common in the 
western parts of the cotton belt than in the Atlantic States. Since the 
civil war the almost complete abandonment of cotton cultivation on the 
sea islands of the coast of Florida and Georgia has evidently reduced the 
number of favorable hibernating localities there, and in so far protected 
the more northern or western portion of the Atlantic States from the 
immigration of the moth from those quarters. In Texas, on the con- 
trary, the cultivation of cotton has been constantly increasing since 
that time, and con sect aneously th( number of hibernating points and 
the risk of serious harm there over extended areas have also increased. 
*Seo abstract of paper read before ttie National Academy of Sciences at Washington, Muy, 1882; 
al.so Annual Iteuort, Department of Agriculture, 1 881— '82, p. ICO. 
