THE CLANDESTINE OWLET-MOTH. 
447 
wheat, young pumpkin-plants, young beans, cabbage-plants, 
and many ptber field and garden vegetables.” “ When first 
disclosed from the eggs, they subsist on the various grasses. 
They descend in the ground on the approach of severe frosts, 
and reappear in the spring about half grown. They seek 
their food in the night or in cloudy weather, and retire 
before sunrise into the ground, or beneath stones or any 
substance which can shelter them from the rays of the sun ; 
here they remain coiled up during the day, except while 
devouring the food which they generally drag into their 
places of concealment. Their transformation to pupm oc¬ 
curs at different periods, sometimes earlier, sometimes later, 
according to the forwardness of the season, hut usually not 
much later than the middle of July.” “ The moths, as 
well as the larvas, vary much in the depth of their color, 
from a pale ash to a deep or obscure brown. The ordinary 
spots of the upper wings of the moth are always connected 
by a blackish line; where the color is of the deepest shade 
those spots are scarcely visible, but when the color is fighter 
they are very obvious.” 
Since the foregoing was written, I have repeatedly ob¬ 
tained the same moths from cut-worms here. The latter 
seem, indeed, to be the most common kind; but they differ 
very little fi’om the cut-worms already described. They 
vary somewhat in color, as remarked by Dr. Melsheimer. 
Young ones are always more or less distinctly marked above 
with pale and dark stripes, and are uniformly paler below. 
The moth is very abundant in the New England States, 
from the middle of June till the middle or end of August. 
The fore wings are generally of a dark ash-color, with 
only a very faint trace of the double transverse wavy bands 
that are found in most species of Agrotis ; the two ordinary 
spots are small and narrow, the anterior spot being oblong 
oval, and connected with the oblique kidney-shaped spot 
by a longitudinal black fine. The hind wings are dirty 
brownish-white, somewhat darker behind. The head, the 
