126 
[November, 
I was not present when five beautiful specimens of Vanessa 
Antiopa were captured in a rough field adjoining Tuddenham Common 
by an old pupil (Mr. John Edwards), as they sucked the saccharine 
moisture from the trunks of some birches less stunted than those 
which grow on the common. But I had a glorious evening in a field 
about half-a-mile from Tuddenham, where a fresh brood of Acidalia 
rubricata appeared en masse , flitting about like pink and purple stars 
in the golden sunshine of the declining sun, about seven o’clock in 
the evening. So abundant were thev, that I had twenty-nine choice 
specimens in my boxes, and a number more in my net. 
It is now the middle of August, and a larva-hunting expedition is 
organized. Many a blow is dealt to the low birches and oaks that 
abound on the heath and marsh, and many are the caterpillars 
that fall into the umbrellas. That of Notodonta dromedarius is 
especially abundant on the birches, and so is that of JV. camelina on 
both birches and oaks. AT. dodoncea and cliaonia also fell occasionally 
from the oaks ; nor is it very often that the caterpillars of JS T . dictceoides 
with their long yellow stripe, and of Acronycta leporina , usually with 
white but now and then with yellow hairs, put in a welcome appearance. 
The larger leaved sallows produced Dicranura furcula , and Salicc 
repens is in places studded with the neat little dwellings of Clostera 
reclusa. Occasionally, too, an oak will yield a welcome larva of Dre- 
pana hamula , and I), falcataria swarms upon the birches ; nor is 
Notodonta ziczac absent from the sallows, or Geometra paptiionaria 
from the birches. But we must not neglect the Galium vcrum in the 
sandy district, or miss the exquisite caterpillar of Anticlea sinuata , of 
■which I have often taken a boxful, and which may be swept or searched 
for according to the taste or convenience of the Entomologist. 
Such was Tuddenham in its palmy days ; but now, alas ! the pro- 
fessional collector has invaded it, and the amateur finds much less to 
reward him in the way of such larvae as that of Dianthoecia irregularis. 
But the winged game is as abundant as ever, only it must be remem- 
bered, that many moths, e. g., especially Acidalia rubricata , change 
their station according to cultivation, and are not found exactly in the 
same locality year after year. Let Tuddenham be visited in the second 
and last weeks of June, and, with favourable weather, the Entomologist 
will be pretty sure to see and find things there which he will not easily 
find in abundance in any other locality. 
P.S. — I cannot remember, for certain, whether it was in July or 
August that an elm near Icklingham, in the same district, produced 
the exquisite little Tortrix, Argyrolepia Schreibersiana. I have, there- 
fore, not included it among the captures of any special expedition. 
Manorbier, Pembrokeshire. 
