The Moths of the British Isles, First Series: Comprising the Families Sphingidæ to NoctuidæSouth, Richard
History
The Moths of the British Isles, First Series: Comprising the Families Sphingidæ to Noctuidæ
South, Richard
Lepidoptera -- Great Britain; Moths -- Great Britain
This pale whity-brown insect (Plate 134, Figs. 19 to 21) is often without
markings, and where these are present on the fore wings they comprise two
series of dusky dots representing two cross lines, and sometimes there is a
dot at the end of the cell. These wings may be shaded with brown, and
occasionally there is a dark band-like shade between the series of dots, in
the male as well as in the smaller and narrower-winged female. Var.
_morrisii_, Dale, seems to be a whiter form of this species. {321} The
caterpillar, which may be found in May and June in the flower stems of
_Aira cæspitosa_, is of a pale pinkish ochreous with three darker bars on
each ring, and a brown, glossy head. The moth flies in July and part of
August, and may be found, often in abundance, in most English and Welsh
counties, in Scotland to Aberdeenshire; and widely spread in Ireland.
THE REDDISH BUFF (_Acosmetia caliginosa_).
Both sexes of this reddish tinged grey-brown species are shown on Plate
153, Figs. 1 [male], 3 [female]. As will be noted, the female is much
smaller than the male. Except that it has been recorded from the Isle of
Wight and from Bloxworth, Dorset, in the past, this species is restricted
to certain portions of the New Forest, Hampshire. Even in these favoured
haunts its numbers have become far less than formerly. The moth is out in
July. Apparently it has no taste for sugar, neither does it seem to visit
blossoms of any kind. It may be disturbed from its retreat among the grass
by day, or netted as it flies at dusk. The caterpillar is stated by Hofmann
to live on saw-wort (_Serratula tinctoria_); it is sap-green, yellow at the
ring divisions, and marked with fine white lines.
THE MARSH MOTH (_Hydrilla palustris_).
The fore wings of the male of this species (Plate 153, Fig. 2) are greyish
brown in colour, and more or less tinged with violet; the cross lines are
dusky, and the reniform and orbicular stigmata are represented by black
dots, the former the larger; hind wings whitish with a smoky tinge. The
female is much smaller, darker, and the cross lines heavier; hind wings
blackish grey.
Stainton ("Manual," 1857) refers to a specimen taken at Compton's Wood,
near York, and this, no doubt, is the same as {322} that stated by Barrett
to have been captured in a moist place at Stockton-in-the-Forest, about
four miles from York, certainly before the year 1855. Then there is a
record of a specimen from Quy Fen, Cambridgeshire, in May, 1862. Seven
years later the late Mr. C. G. Barrett took a specimen as it fluttered
about a gas-lamp outside Norwich. In 1877 and 1878 the use of bright
collecting lanterns in Wicken Fen may have led to the capture of nearly
twenty Marsh Moths, anyway it seems to have been a record for the time.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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