Wings usually cleft into a series of separate plumes; legs elongate and slender with long tibial spurs.
Only two families are included here: the Pterophoridae, or plume moths (fig. i s), have the fore-wings never more than four cleft ; the larvae feed either openly, or less frequently, in stems or seed-vessels and the pupae are markedly spiny. The Orneodidae or many-plume moths (fig. i6) are a very small family with the wings cleft into six or more plume-like divisions. The family is widely distributed and represented in Great Britain by Orneodes hexadactyla, whose larvae feed on the flower-buds of honeysuckle.
Hind wings with vein Sc+R, partially fused with or approximated to beyond the basal cells and with present.
This superfamily includes several thousand species of small to medium-sized moths of slender build with relatively long legs. The fore-wings are usually elongate-triangular, sometimes very narrow, while the hind wings are relatively broad. The chief families are the following : The Pyraustidae form an extensive and widely distributed group characterized by vein R3 in the fore wings arising separately from the cell. They are particularly numerous in the tropics and one of the largest genera is Scoparia, whose larvae mainly feed upon mosses and lichens, among which they construct silken galleries. Nymphula and several allied genera are interesting in that their larvae are aquatic or subaquatic, and in some species possess tracheal gills. The grape leaf-folder Desmia funeralis is common in the United States and its larvae form re treats by folding portions of the leaves into tunnels. The Pyralidae differ from the foregoing in having vein of the fore wings basally fused with the stem of They are a small family many of whose larvae feed upon dry or decaying substances. Several species are found among meal, grain, or chaff, and the meal moth (Pyralis farinalis) has become widely distributed through commerce. The Crambidae, or grass moths, are small insects with narrow, elongate fore-wings, extremely abundant among grass, where they rest on the stems during daytime with their wings closed folded. The Phycitidae lack vein in the fore-wings, and the hind-wings have a group of hairs forming a pecten near the base of the cell. Their larvae are very variable in habit and those of the Mediterranean flour moth (Epliestia kuehniella) (fig. 17) are pests in flour mills throughout the world; in the North American Laetilia coccidivora the larvae prey on scale insects and in the oriental toon moth (Hypsipyla robusta) they are shoot-borers. The small family Galleridae in
cludes the bee moth (Galleria mellonella), which infests the combs of hives, while the tropical Thyrididae often have translucent spots on both pairs of wings and in the hind pair vein Cu, is wanting.
M present as a simple vein within the cell or, more rarely, branched in one or both pairs of wings: Cu, present in both pairs of wings.
This superfamily exhibits the above primitive features in the venation, but the radial cell or areole is never developed as in the Cossoidea. The most interesting family is the Psychidae, or bag worm moths, in which the males have the wings thinly clothed with scales and hairs, but almost devoid of colour pattern, while the females are wingless, and in some forms are so degenerate that the mouth-parts and legs are also wanting. Their larvae inhabit cases or bags formed of silk covered with vegetable frag ments, and carry these cases with them as they crawl over their food-plants. In many species the females do not leave these cases after emergence from the pupa, laying their eggs and dying in this same habitation. The family is mainly tropical; very few species are British and only about 20 inhabit North America. The Zygaenidae include the burnets and foresters; they are often metallic green or bluish insects frequently spotted with crimson. They fly slowly by day in grassy places and their cater pillars feed upon low plants. Ten species inhabit the British isles, but in the tropics the family is more considerably developed, and in Himanopterus the hind wings are drawn out into long filaments. The Eucleidae, or Limacodidae, are a small family with vestigial mouth-parts and mainly interesting on account of their curious slug-like larvae. The latter are flattened below and move by means of secondarily developed sucker discs, of which there are eight pairs; some of these larvae are smooth above and others are armed with spine like processes. They construct dense egg-like cocoons, each provided with a lid to allow of the emergence of the moth. Among other families the Megalopygidae or flannel moths are more especially American, and Lagoa crispata is well known on account of its larvae possessing poisonous spines.