28 
R. W. BOWYER—METHODS OE MOTH-COLLECTING. 
confined to smooth larvae. Hairy caterpillars, the “ woolly hear ” 
for instance, are protected from birds by these hairs and need no 
protection of colour. Many again have some acrid taste about 
them, which birds dislike, and they have no need to resemble 
other objects. If you were to take a handful of caterpillars and 
throw them to a chicken, you would find that those most like twigs 
would be considered the greatest delicacies. The conspicuously 
marked larva of the currant-moth, Abraxas grossulariata, would 
be untouched, or at all events uneaten, unless the chicken had been 
kept on short allowance of food. Indeed, you may see that if a 
larva, from smell or taste, is not a favourite food for birds, it is 
to its advantage that it should be as gaily coloured as possible, 
labelled as it were, “ Don’t touch me, I am not fit for food.” It 
would be small consolation if, while being nasty to the taste, it 
were not easily distinguished. A bird might give it a peck, 
thinking it a delicacy, and then, finding its mistake, go away in 
disgust; the peck would be as fatal to the larva as a hearty meal 
made from it. 
If one were to trust to the eye alone in collecting larvae, the 
number found, of some species, would be very small. It is often 
in fact hard to re-find those already in your possession, and which 
you know are at rest on some small piece of the food-plant. Much 
indeed may be done by the eye and by mere chance collecting. 
Dull-fed larvae are constantly to be found when wandering about 
in search of some convenient corner to spin up in. But the way to 
obtain them in abundance is to beat for them. Put an old umbrella 
or some regular form of beating-tray under a bough, strike it sharply 
with a stick, and the larvae will fall; they may even then be readily 
mistaken for little pieces of dried stick. Those which feed on low- 
growing herbage are to be obtained by “ sweeping ” for them, i.e. 
by drawing a strong net over their food-plants. These operations 
are in many cases best carried out at night, for many larvae come 
out to feed at night only, while in the daytime they retire into 
inaccessible hiding-places. 
One way of keeping caterpillars is to tie them in muslin bags, 
to sleeve them out as it is called, on a branch of their food-plant: 
they are then under natural conditions. There is a disadvantage 
in this that their habits are not so readily studied. I prefer to 
keep mine in cages, with earth at the bottom for burrowing species, 
and with their food placed in water. Fresh air and the natural 
temperature are a desideratum, and a shed out of doors is the best 
place to keep them in. It is best not to keep too many together, 
and to supply them constantly with fresh leaves : growing plants 
in small pots will often save much trouble. Two larvae must be 
known by sight, which are cannibals to the worst degree; they are 
those of Cosmia trapezina and Scopelosoma satellitia. The latter is 
very easy to recognize, being velvet-black and to be found on the 
oak. That of Trapezina may easily escape notice at first among a 
miscellaneous lot; it is green and obscurely sprinkled with black 
markings, and is to be found on nearly every kind of tree and bush. 
