Page:The Zoologist, 1st series, vol 1 (1843).djvu/228

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200
Insects.

insect by means of an unimpregnated female, we proceeded to White-moss on the 30th of April last, and after a little time succeeded in finding a female, but it did not attract the males until near the close of their flight at 5, P.M.; still we had sufficient sport to induce us to try again the next afternoon with the same female, and I can assure you we were quite satisfied, although a strong easterly wind blew all the time. The males came in abundance, and alighting on or about the box, allowed themselves to be picked off with the fingers, without attempting to escape. By lying down on the moss and looking over the heath, we could perceive the males beating up towards us at a distance of a hundred and fifty yards. Having gratified ourselves, we left for home, and passing through "Boggart-hole clough," a wild and romantic valley celebrated in Roby's 'Traditions of Lancashire,' we stopped some time to see an oak felled, and during the interval I was astonished to see an emperor fly with great swiftness between two trees I had passed under, and immediately afterwards alight on the box, covered with gauze and containing the female, which I had carried in my hand all the way from the moss to that place, a distance of not less than a mile and a half, by far the greatest distance I ever heard of a male tracking a female. Some entomologists may think this male had been bred in the clough, but I am not aware of a single specimen, with the above exception, having ever been found away from the moss, where they are very local. We captured Lasiocampa Rubi and Quercus in the same manner on the moss; the former insect will come till it is quite dark, and both species fly with greater rapidity than Saturnia Pavonia-minor.—Robert S. Edleston; Fearne Acre, Cheetham Hill, Manchester, May 10, 1843.

Note on the Habits of Dytiscus punctulatus. I have several times kept specimens of Dytiscus punctulatus in confinement, both singly and in pairs, but never succeeded in preserving them more than a few months; whereas Esper is said to have kept D. marginalis alive three years and a half—an extraordinary longevity, which Stephens .attributes, with great probability, to its celibacy. When I kept a pair together, I always found that the male died first; and his dead body had generally been mutilated and pretty nearly devoured by his widow. The females were at all times much more voracious than the males. I generally fed them with raw beef, of which they sucked the juices; but in summer I sometimes supplied them with small aquatic insects, which they seized with their fore feet, and tore to pieces with their mandibles, rejecting the elytra and other hard parts. I also fed them on earth-worms, and once introduced into the bottle a small frog, about an inch and a half long; on my return a few hours after, the frog had been despatched and partly devoured, and this by a single specimen. The larva of this and other large Dytisci is even more voracious than the imago. I have seen them devouring horse-leeches; and in the Anatomy-school at Oxford is one preserved in spirits, along with a small fry of a pike, longer than itself, which it had killed, and was devouring when taken by Professor Kidd. The appearance of the insect, when seen through the medium of the water, is extremely interesting, from the rich olive-green of the elytra (which is much heightened in this situation), the yellow labrum and margins of the thorax and elytra, and the silvery brilliance of the eyes, which appear as if invested with a globule of air. They speedily become familiarized to a certain extent, and will follow the finger round the glass, in expectation of food.— Fredk. Holme; C.C.C. Oxford, May 15, 1843.

Note on the capture of Claviger foveolatus. Mr. Ingall took a specimen of this very rare little beetle on the 29th of April last, in a stony field at the back of Box Hill; and on the 1st of May 1 captured a specimen in the same situation. Both were taken in tl