STRAWBERRY-LEAF BUTTON-MOTH. 
71 
The following observations on the attack of a Moth-caterpillar 
often severely injurious to Strawberry leafage was communicated by 
Dr. Ellis, of Liverpool, from Mr. Richard A. Wrench, Dee Banks, 
Chester:— 
“ I enclose specimens of a grub which infests the Strawberries 
about here (Dee Banks, Chester), and does a great deal of harm ; the 
bulk of the Strawberries for Liverpool Market are from here. I may 
say it usually makes its appearance about the beginning of May, and 
lasts until about the end of August, when it goes away. 
“ Young Strawberry plants of twelve months old are never affected; 
two-year-old plants are affected rather badly, but tliree-year-old plants 
are invariably ruined. 
“I have two fields adjoining one another, the old field utterly 
ruined by the grub, the next, only separated by a hedge, perfectly 
clear ; but next year, when it will be two years old, it is sure to be 
full of blight.” 
Here we have only the above notes and Dr. Ellis’s sketch* to guide 
to means of prevention, but I think these are enough to help us. 
It will be noticed the caterpillar is hanging by a thread, and, as it 
has the means of lowering itself to the ground, it is very likely that 
though many may turn to chrysalids in the spun-up leaves, yet that 
many may go down their thread to the earth, and the winter brood 
there turn to chrysalids, and that it is from these chrysalids that the 
Moths come out in the following spring, at the season to start a new 
attack on the new leafage in May, as mentioned by Mr. Wrench. 
Mr. Wrench notices the absence of attack in the first year, mode¬ 
rate attack in the second, and devastation in the third, which also 
seems to me to point to the chief numbers of attackers coming up out 
of the ground, for, if these little Moths flew to the plants in any great 
numbers from elsewhere , the attack might be expected to be much the 
same in amount on beds one or two years old. 
If this is the case, the treatment of skimming off the surface-soil 
with the chrysalids in it, and getting rid of it in such a way that the 
* The following description of the Moth, Peronea (? comariana), in its three 
stages, is communicated by Dr. Ellis:— “Larva: Cylindrical, shining, slightly 
bristly ; head glassy, pale yellow, with brown spots on each side behind; general 
colour green, darker above, lighter below, with the dorsal vessel well marked and 
darker. Feeds in May and early part of June on Strawberry, drawing together the 
leaves and flowers for this purpose, in the latter case feeding on the calyx and 
receptacle. Pupa: Pale green, with reddish wing-cases and abdominal segments. 
Imago : Emerges end of June. Fore wings very pale ochreous, slightly darker on 
the hinder half; near the middle of the costa is a dark brown, nearly black, 
triangular blotch, reaching two-thirds across the wing, and continued to the inner 
margin as a slight brownish cloud. A dark patch on the inner margin indicates the 
edge of the basal patch. Hind wings grey.” 
