Page:Jardine Naturalist's Library Exotic Moths.djvu/207

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
HARPYIA BANKSIÆ.
165

colour is greenish-yellow, each segment with an oblique whitish stripe directed backwards. All the segments have round white spots surrounded with black on the lower parts, and on each side rather above the middle, from the fourth to the eleventh segment inclusively, there is a cluster of three or four round white spots placed on a black ground. The anal segment bears a small black horn, and wants the upper lateral spots. This caterpillar feeds on the Banksia Ilicifolia, and when near its transformation, it is, to use Lewin's words, of considerable bulk, very showy, and in general a great devourer. He found it change to a pupa in February, spinning on the surface of the earth a slight web or cell, and collecting about it some fragments of earth and leaves in order to disguise it. It remained in this dormant state thirty-six days, and was on the wing in March. The moth occurs in the neighbourhood of Sidney.



ARCTIIDÆ.

Many of the families into which the nocturnal Lepidoptera have been divided by authors, however distinct they may appear when viewed at their extreme points of difference, comprise species of so ambiguous a character, that it is not easy to pre-