INSECTS. 
85 
These moths are similar to the Arctia textor, of Harris, but appear 
to differ from them in the spots on the upper-wings of the male, and 
in some other slight particulars. The habit of webbing up the limbs 
is also the same. 
INSECTS FOUND ON THE TERMINAL SHOOTS. 
The insects attacking the terminal shoots of the cotton-plant are 
at present very little known ; but when their habits shall have been 
more thoroughly investigated, there is no doubt that they will be 
found to be much more destructive than is generally supposed. 
No practical planter can have passed through his cotton-fields, 
without frequently observing that the terminal leaves of many of the 
plants have been webbed up and eaten out, or that many of the 
young blossoms have suddenly turned brown, or “ flared” open, and, 
on the slightest touch, fall to the ground. Some of this damage 
may no doubt be caused by excessive moisture, or heat, or by an 
unhealthy state of the plant itself. But if the ends of all the shoots 
be closely examined, it will generally be found that several minute 
insects lie hidden between the folds of the leaves and buds, probably 
feeding upon the tender foliage, or extracting the sap. The aphis, 
or cotton-louse, is often found in such places. 
TUE PEA-GREEN CATERPILLAR. 
In the cotton-fields near Tallahassee, many of the tender leaves 
and young blossoms of vigorous and healthy plants were observed 
to be webbed together in a mass. Upon opening one of them, a 
small caterpillar, (FI. VII. fig. 3 ,) between three-fifths and seven- 
tenths of an inch in length, was discovered feeding upon the interior. 
This caterpillar is of a pea-green color, with a dark longitudinal 
stripe running down the middle of the back, and a row of two dark 
spots with white centres to each on every segment of the body, except 
the first, running parallel on each side of the dark stripe. The head 
is black ; the first segment of the same color, with a dividing line of 
white between it and the head, and another light division between 
this and the second segment. The pectoral feet are black, and the 
body sparingly clothed with short bristles, or hairs. 
This caterpillar, for the most part, lives and feeds in the terminal 
shoots ; but I have found it webbed up between the outer calyx and 
boll of the cotton, or in the calyx of the flower. 
The chrysalis, which is of a light-brown color, is about two-fifths 
of an inch in length, and is formed in the same webbed-up terminal 
shoot which served the caterpillar as a shelter. It shed the cater- 
pillar-skin about the 27th of September, and the perfect moth came 
out in about ten days. 
The moth, when expanded, measures from three-fifths to seven- 
tenths of an inch across the wings ; the body and thorax are of a 
