The caterpillar of another still more singular grain-moth (_Tinea
Hordei_, Kirby and Spence) proves sometimes very destructive of
granaries. The mother-moth, in May or June, lays about twenty or
more eggs on a grain of barley or wheat; and when the caterpillars
are hatched they disperse, each selecting a single grain. M. Réaumur
imagines that sanguinary wars must sometimes arise, in cases of
preoccupancy, a single grain of barley being a rich heritage for one
of these tiny insects; but he confesses he never saw such contests.
When the caterpillar has eaten its way into the interior of the grain,
it feeds on the farina, taking care not to gnaw the skin nor even to
throw out its excrements, so that except the little hole, scarcely
discernible, the grain appears quite sound. When it has eaten all the
farina, it spins itself a case of silk within the now hollow grain, and
changes to a pupa in November.
Tent-making Caterpillars.
The caterpillars of a family of small moths (_Tineidæ_), which feed on
the leaves of various trees, such as the hawthorn, the elm, the oak,
and most fruit-trees, particularly the pear, form habitations which are
exceedingly ingenious and elegant. They are so very minute that they
require close inspection to discover them; and to the cursory observer,
unacquainted with their habits, they will appear more like the withered
leaf-scales of the tree, thrown off when the buds expand, than
artificial structures made by insects. It is only, indeed, by seeing
them move about upon the leaves, that we discover they are inhabited by
a living tenant, who carries them as the snail does its shell.
These tents are from a quarter of an inch to an inch in length, and
usually about the breadth of an oat-straw. That they are of the colour
of a withered leaf is not surprising; for they are actually composed of
a piece of leaf; not, however, cut out from the whole thickness, but
artfully separated from the upper layer, as a person might separate one
of the leaves of paper from a sheet of pasteboard.
The tents of this class of caterpillars, which are found on the
elm, the alder, and other trees with serrated leaves, are much in
the shape of a minute goldfish. They are convex on the back, where
the indentations of the leaf out of which they have been cut add to
the resemblance, by appearing like the dorsal fins of the fish. By
depriving one of those caterpillars common on the hawthorn of its
tents, for the sake of experiment, we put it under the necessity of
making another; for, as Pliny remarks of the clothes-moth, they will
rather die of hunger than feed unprotected. When we placed it on a
fresh hawthorn leaf, it repeatedly examined every part of it, as if
seeking for its lost tent, though, when this was put in its way, it
would not again enter it; but, after some delay, commenced a new one.
(J. R.)
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