The Moths of the British Isles, Second Series: Comprising the Families Noctuidæ to HepialidæSouth, Richard
History
The Moths of the British Isles, Second Series: Comprising the Families Noctuidæ to Hepialidæ
South, Richard
Lepidoptera -- Great Britain; Moths -- Great Britain
This species (Plate 19, Figs. 6-8) has an almost universal distribution. It
is found in Europe, Asia, Africa, America, and Australia. As regards the
British Isles, it was first recorded by Mr. Edleston, who noted a specimen
taken at Salford, Lancashire, by Mr. John Thomas, in September, 1840. This
specimen, also one captured at Mickleham, Surrey, and others "taken in
various localities," are referred to in the _Entomologist's Annual_ for
1855. The following year one was reported from Exeter and one from the Isle
of Wight. The summer of 1859 was a hot one (as were the two previous
summers), and the species was recorded from the following localities:
Brighton, Bristol, Cambridge, Edmonton, Isle of Wight, Ramsgate, Torquay,
Weston-super-Mare, Worthing, and other places. Apart from the captures on
the Devonshire coast, chiefly at Torquay, where the moth seems to occur
pretty nearly every year, the records since 1859 are: 1866 (Scarborough);
1871 (Wakefield); 1876 (Hartlepool, and Kentish Coast); 1877 and 1881
(Gloucester); 1890 (Chatham); 1895 (Tunbridge Wells); 1901 (Isle of Wight);
1902 (Chester and Harwich); 1903 (Lewes). In all cases only single
specimens. The species has been noted once in South Wales, and twice in
North Wales; several specimens were secured in 1898 near Berwick-on-Tweed,
and odd specimens have been recorded from Ireland.
The caterpillar is variable in colour; in one form it is green with a
yellowish stripe along the sides, and in another the colour is purplish
brown. The form figured (Plate 20, Fig. 2) is pinkish brown with a
black-edged whitish line along the back, and a pinkish freckled and
brownish edged yellowish stripe along the sides; the raised dots are white
as a rule, but sometimes in the darker forms they are blackish. In some
examples of the green form the dots and lines are black. {53}
In 1869 two specimens of the moth were reared from caterpillars imported
with tomatoes from Spain; twenty-three years later Mr. Arkle referred to
the arrival here of _H. armigera_ in the larval state with consignments of
tomatoes, from Valencia, landed at Liverpool in the months of June and
July. The late Mr. Tugwell reared larvae, from eggs deposited by a captured
female moth, on scarlet geranium; and there is a record of the finding of
caterpillars on such plants, in the autumn of 1876, in the Isle of Wight.
Specimens of the moth found at large in Britain occur in the autumn.
In the United States of America, where it is known as the "Cotton Boll
worm," "Corn-ear worm," and "Tomato fruit worm," this caterpillar is
chiefly destructive to corn crops, as of the five generations stated to
occur during the year in the States three occur in cornfields. It also
attacks beans, tobacco, pumpkins, melons, oranges, garden flowering-plants,
and many kinds of wild plants. The British nurserymen and farmers are
perhaps to be congratulated on the fact that this moth is only an
accidental visitor and not a native.
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