The silver-spotted tiger moth, Halisidota argentata Pack., is a potentially dangerous defoliator of Douglas fir in British Columbia. Natural control factors have always prevented populations from building up to destructive proportions.

The literature contains little information on this insect. Fletcher recorded the first outbreak of what was probably H. argentata in British Columbia in 1887 (2). Moths were identified as H. sobrina Stretch, but this form is now recorded only from California so it was probably H. argentata. The outbreak, probably on southern Vancouver Island, was reported as “committing great depredations on the spruces here.” Mathers found H. argentata at Chilliwack in the Fraser River Valley in 1934, but there was no report of an outbreak (4). A few larvae were collected on southern Vancouver Island from 1936 to 1952. In 1953 a considerable number of colonies were observed, and the following year the silver-spotted tiger moth was in infestation proportions. In 1955 the outbreak increased in intensity, and spread northward to the limit of its known range. A survey in the spring of 1956 failed to find a single colony south of Lantzville, and the population in the northern portion of the range was greatly reduced.

The use of olfactory repellents, especially against biting insects, is an important protective measure. It is also a matter of common knowledge that certain insects are able to locate their mates or their prey largely through the agency of attractive scents. Concerning these latter, Dethier remarks that, “we recognize the fact that no one attractant alone performs the service of guiding an organism to its proper habitat, or mate, or food. The desired end is achieved by a complex array of stimuli working in harmony. In chemical attractants, however, one finds precision guidance. The action of others, as light, temperature, humidity, is comparatively gross, approximating as it does usually, a vicinity. The extreme value of chemical attractants to an organism lies in the specificity and accuracy of operation.” (1).

This is a report on field trials near Lethbridge, Alberta, in 1954, to determine whether the artificial distribution of the bacterium Pseudomonas aeruginosa (Schroeter) Migula would contribute to the biological control of a natural population of grasshoppers. This bacterium was isolated from laboratory-reared grasshoppers, and Bucher and Stephens (1957) showed it to be relatively virulent when experimentally fed to grasshoppers but very susceptible to desiccation. Unpublished information from Miss Stephens indicated that the addition of sucrose (5.0 per cent), casein (1.0 per cent), and gastric mucin (1.0 per cent) to suspensions of P. aeruginosa helped to preserve the viability of the bacteria when dried in thin films. Therefore, these substances were incorporated in all formulations used in the field experiments.

The existence of strains of mites resistant to parathion has been well established (Garman, 1950; Lienk, Dean, & Chapman, 1952; Newcomer & Dean, 1952; Smith & Fulton, 1951). Resistant strains of the European red mite, Metatetranychus ulmi (Koch), first occurred in orchards of the Pacific northwest in 1950 (Newcomer, 1951; O'Neill & Hantsbarger, 1951), approximately three years after parathion was first used as an acaricide. Two other species of orchard mites, the Pacific mite, Tetranychus pacificus McG., and T. mcdanieli McG., were subsequently reported to have developed parathion-resistant strains in the same area (Newcomer & Dean, 1953). Though parathion is lethal to most predacious mites and insects, Huffaker and Kennett (1953) found a difference in tolerance between species of Typhlodromus in the field and in the laboratory: T. reticulatus Oudms. was very susceptible to parathion whereas T. occidentalis Nesbitt was not appreciably affected by it.

Members of the present genus are commonly encountered in faunistic studies of the southwestern United States and Mexico, but little or no informati,on has been recorded concerning their biology or ,host relationships and taxonomic status.

Brauer and Bergenstamm established Mochlosoma with validum, new, as the type and sole original species, (Zweifl. d. Kaiserl. Mus., IV, 1889, 126). The type series is in the Vienna Natural History Museum, and apparently it was not seen by any American worker in Diptera until 1925, when Aldrich recharacterized the genotype and restricted the type series to the single male specimen from Pennsylvania, (Ann. Ent. Soc. Amer., XVIII, 116-118). More recently Townsend also redefined the genus (Manual of Myiology, part VII, 1938, 346-347). These interpretations of the generic characters are now generally accepted for Mochlosoma and are summarized for ready reference to all species included in the accompanying key.

Chant (1956) has shown that spiders are common predators in apple orchards in southeast England. Dondale (1956) listed the species of spiders found in Nova Scotia orchards. This is a note on population densities in the latter orchards from 1953 to 1956.

The sampling device used in this study was a cloth-covered, yard-square tray (Lord, 1956), supplemented in a minor way by a collecting umbrella. Each tray or umbrella collection represented the spiders jarred from the lower branches of a single tree, or from the lower branches of half of each of two trees.

These observations, dealing with noctuid larvae, were made while the writer was associated with the Canadian Forest Insect and Disease Survey. Twenty-four species have been examined: 9 in the Hadeninae, 10 in the Cucullinae, 3 in the Amphipyrinae, and 2 in the Catocalinae. The arrangement of the subfamilies follows that of McDunnough (1938). This material is being published because many of these species have not been included in Crumb (1956) and new data are presented on the species considered by him. The descriptions were made from living and preserved larvae. Notes on biologies, unless otherwise indicated, refer to those made by the writer in Manitoba and Alberta during the years 1944-1954. The hosts are those on which larvae have been reared to adults by the Forest Insect and Disease Survey, except in a few cases where the host is cited from the literature. “Free-living larvae”, are those that feed openly. When the number of instars is not known the larvae are described as antepenultimate, penultimate, and ultimate. In measurements, H.W. refers to head width, B.L., to total larval length, and B.W., to greatest larval width.

A considerable amount of literature has been published on the genus Pseudohazis and its species but there is only one brief mention of the possibility of a two-year life cycle (Dyar 1904). Several rearings of P. eglanterina form normalis Dyar, completed by the author, have provided conclusive evidence that a two-year cycle is the usual life history pattern in southwestern British Columbia. One such rearing is herein described. This two-year cycle, the first winter in the egg stage and the second winter in the pupal stage, is not in phase as mature larvae and adult moths may be found in the same area at the same time. Detailed descriptions of larval and adult stages are in Dyar 1894 and Packard 1912. Acknowledgment is due to Dr. E. G. Munroe, Unit of Systematic Entomology, Ottawa, for his assistance in reviewing literature and specimen material

Specimens recently received for identification from Dr. C. Bernard Lewis, Institute of Jamaica, Kingston, proved to belong to the widely distributed Neotropical species Sparagmia gigantalis Guenée, described from NouvelleFribourg, Brazil. These specimens agree with others from Jamaica in the collection of Mr. N. Shoumatoff, New Yorlr, in having the ground colour of a much brighter orange than in South American specimens, in having the transverse lines somewhat weaker, and in having the submarginal violaceaus patch of the fore wing relatively pale. These characters are not duplicated in the long series from various parts of Central and South America with which I have compared the Jamaican specimens, and I accordingly designate the latter as Sparagmia gigantalis shouwatoffi, new subspecies, with type material as follows: Holotype, male, “Monigue” [Moneague], St. Ann, Jamaica, July 19, 1933, A. Avinoff and N. Shoumatoff; allotype, female, Baron Hill, Trelawny, Jamaica, October, 1931, Lilly Perkins; one male paratype, Greenhills, Hardwar Gap, Jamaica, July 17, 1936, E. Paine; these specimens in the collection of N. Shoumatoff, deposited at the Carnegie Museum, Pittsburgh. AdditionaI paratypes as follows: in the Canadian National Collection, one male, Christiana, Jamaica, August, 1940, and one female, Jacks Hill, St. Andrew, Jamaica, Aug. 5, 1951, J. V. Neish, type No.6460, C.N.C.; in the Institute of Jamaica, one male, Jacks Hill, St. Andrew, Jamaica, Aug. 5, 1951, J. V. Neish, this specimen with most of the fore wing suffused with dark brown.