GOAT MOTH. 
63 
as a smaller kind, the Sir ex Juvencus , are more often at work than is 
supposed. 
On September 19th a fine specimen of the female of S. gigas was 
forwarded to me by Mr. Craig from the Bradford Estate Office, near 
Shifnal, with an enquiry as to whether it was injurious to Larch trees, 
as it seemed very fond of Larch wood, and had been seen with its 
ovipositor stuck into the bark of Larch trees, where it was supposed 
to be placing its eggs. 
The female of the Si rex gigas is black, banded with yellow, and 
lays her eggs by means of the strong ovipositor beneath the blunt point 
to the tail figured in the sketch of the insect in the act of flying. 
The eggs are thus inserted in solid wood, and, like many other kinds 
of timber insects, the female appears to prefer sickly trees where there 
is no rapid flow of sap, or felled trunks to attack. 
The maggots are cylindrical and whitish, and the head is furnished 
with strong jaws, by means of which they gnaw their way forward 
and form large borings in various kinds of Pine wood, thus wasting 
much of what would otherwise have been serviceable timber. 
These maggots feed for about seven weeks, and may then go 
through their changes to the chrysalis and to the perfect insect in 
about a month, or the appearance of the insect from the attacked 
wood may not take place for years. 
Where these large maggots, are found in felled Pine it is desirable 
to have the trunk sawed up at once, so as to get rid of the centre of 
attack, as, where there are a few observable, it is very likely there 
will be many more in that special trunk; but as yet attack of this 
insect to a seriously injurious amount does not seem to have been 
noticed in this country. 
POPLAR. 
Goat Moth. Cossus ligniperda, Fab. 
On May 15th Mr. Angus McIntosh forwarded me from Llanerch, 
Llanelly, S. Wales, a piece of Poplar wood containing two caterpillars 
of the Goat Moth, with the mention that in thinning some Poplars 
and Willows which grew on a very wet piece of ground it was noticed 
that several trees which were cut down had been bored into by the 
grubs. These had made their way into the wood at the lower part of 
the stems of the trees below the surface of the ground, and had bored 
upwards. About a dozen of the caterpillars were in the Poplar from 
which the specimens were taken, and the tree was nearly dead. 
