LEOPARD; MOTH, BROWN-TAIL; MOTH, GYPSY ) .
Others feed upon the pith of herbaceous plants. A number of species feed upon the inside of growing furits. Only a very few species are known to be carnivorous. The household moths (Tines') are well known on account of the injury they work among clothes, carpets, furs, etc. Other species attack grain, meal, flour, hay, tobacco, dried herbs, drugs and a variety of stored products; other bore into timber, or damage human property in some other way. Some recompense is obtained, how ever, from the silkworms (q.v.), the moths whose cocoons furnish silk.
There is considerable variety in the form of the caterpillars of moths, but most are worm-like, and the structure and appendages resemble those of butterfly caterpillars (q.v.). The great majority possess besides the six minute thoracic legs the usual four pairs of uprolegs," or false feet, in the middle of the body, and a fifth pair on the hindermost (13th) segment (somite) of the body, which in real ity are clasping organs needed for clinging to twigs in the process of molting. In some (numerous geometrids, noctuids and psychids) these prolegs are reduced in number, and in the geometrids they are placed in only two pairs on the 9th and 13th segments, and these larva can progress only by looping the body upward (see MEASURING-WORMS) . Other va riations of this feature exist, as the sucker-like pads of the Megolopygidt• and Cochlidader.
°The bodies of the larva of moths,'" to quote Holland, care. covered with tubercles, the loca tion and arrangement of which have in recent years received considerable attention from students, and are thought to furnish a clue to the lines of descent of certain families. These tubercles sometimes carry only a single hair, in other cases they carry large tufts of hairs; they may be small and inconspicuous, or they may be developed until they assume the form of great spines, horns, or bulbous projections.° Some moth caterpillars exhibit bright and beautiful colors, and move about fearlessly, protected by thorny projections, or nauseous exudations, or by hairs which possesssevere stinging properties. Others present striking ex amples of protective resemblance and mimicry, in color or form or attitudes, or all three re spects. While many are solitary in their habits others are gregarious, forming and 'processions) during their feeding life which disperse when the time for pupation arrives.
Many moth-larva enter the ground and sur round themselves with an earthen cell in which to transform into and pass the pupal stage. Others spin cocoons in great variety, usually formed more or less of silk, and well protected against both the weather and enemies. Some are hidden away under leaves, beneath loose bark, in the crevices of rocks or old stumps or fastened to the branches of trees. As a rule the cocoons are whitish or brown in color, never ornamented with the bright silvery or golden spots characteristic of the chrysalids of many butterflies. Escape from the tough silken kind of cocoons is aided by a copious saliva which dissolves or cuts the silk, so that the newly born insect may wriggle out.
The anatomy of the moths is substantially the same as that of butterflies, but in these heterocerous families the head is not so prom inent. The eyes, however, are often larger and better, as would be expected of insects mainly crepuscular in their habits; and some have the suctorial apparatus in high perfection, so that many of the hawk-moths and noctids can poise upon whirring wings, and inserting the long proboscis suck nectar from flowers with out alighting; and these take a considerable part in the cross-fertilization of plants. On the other hand, in the bombyef ne moths and their allies, the proboscis is small and some of them have no mouth-parts or ability to feed at alL They are simply animate winged reservoirs of reproductive energy, and, when the sexual func tions have been completed, they • The antenna of moths assume a great va riety of forms. They may be simple or branched, thread-like, furiform, spatulate or like broad feathers,• and those of the males fre quently differ from those of the females. In an attempt at classification various subdivisions have been proposed, but lepidopterists no longer make artificial groupings of the families, whose inter-relationships seem very uncertain. Most of the families, of which about 50 are recog nized by modern systematists, are represented in America, but several families are confined to the Oriental regions, and a few are exclusively African. The criteria principally used in sep arating families are found in the character and arrangement of tubercles, and in the structure of the wings. The lowest are the very small moths called Micropterygidee, with bronzy golden wings, whose larva show striking af finities with the caddis flies, and feed in damp moss. The large yellowish-brown
moths (Hepcaltdce) come next, whose larva and incomplete pupa live underground and feed on roots; followed by the Zygamidte or burnet moths, which are small day-flying insects adorned with bright metallic colors. Their larva feed openly on various plants, and spin elongated cocoons. The tropical Chalcostulse and Limacodiidte are allied to them; also the large, day-flying, brilliant tropical castniids, which have clubbed antenna like butterflies. The small family Megalopygidce, of hairy American moths, are singular in having seven pairs of prolegs. The Psychida are a small but universally distributed family characterized by the extreme degradation of the wingless fe males; the caterpillars live in portable cases made of sticks, grass, etc., and are called "bas ket worms" (q.v.). The Cossidte are large moths, unable to feed, most numerous in the tropics and exemplified in Europe by the well known gnat and leopard moths (qq.v.) ; only two species are North American; and the Sesiida' are the clearwings (q.v.), resembling wasps. In the Tortriculte is found a very large assemblage of small species known as leaf rollers (q.v.), plentiful in the United States and embracing many pests, as the codling moth, etc. Another immense family of evil repute is the Tmeidce, represented by the clothes-moth, flour-moths (qq.v.) and the like, which damage woolen goods, furs and stored products of every kind, as well as feed upon plants, some of them performing an essential work in cross-fertiliza tion, conspicuously the yucca-moths (q,v.) ; there are thousands of species. The plume moths (q.v.) come next, followed by a series of families having obtect pupa, which never emerge from the cocoon until the final molt. Among these are the Pyralidce, a huge and varied family, having nearly 800 beautifully marked species in the United States alone, and largely destructive to cultivated plants. Repre sentatives are the grape-leaf-folder, print-moth, sugar-beet moth, clover-hay worm, snout-moths, grass-moths, corn-stalk borer, bee-moth, leaf crumplers, dried-currant moth and others, many of which are elsewhere described in this work. The egger-moths, tussock-moths (qq.v.) and some minor families are nearly related to the pyralids. The gayly colored tiger-moths (q.v.) carry the list to the owlet-moths (q.v.), which belong to the cosmopolitan nocturnal group Noc tuidce, and these are followed by several fami lies, chiefly belonging to the Old World. Then come the (see DEATH'S-HEAD and HAwit-MoTti), familiar all over the world; and the great assemblage of small, plainly but ex quisitely colored geometrids (sec MEASURING WORM). Closely related are the tropical Uraniidce, which contain large and magnificent green and gold tropical species — the glory of the forests of Brazil and the East Indies. Many of these, as of the Oriental family are "tailed) and simulate the papilionid butter flies in many ways. Next to these are placed the silk-worm moths (Bombycide), and several families of large tropical moths, leading up to the great Saturnians (Saturnttdce), scattered over most of the warmer parts of the world; among them is the great Attacus atlas of India, the largest of all Lepidoptera, and many of the largest and most notable of American cocoon-. making species, such as the Ailanthus silk-moth, the Cecropia, Polyphemus, Luna and several others well known and elsewhere described.
Bibliography.-- The literature relating to moths is very extensive. The most complete and scientific account of the families, technically considered, is found in Hamson's of the moths of the world, published since 1898 by the British Museum. The Smithsonian In stitution published simultaneously a (List' of North American species by H. G. Dyar. The textbooks of Packard and Comstock give suffi, ciently full accounts of structure; and Carpen ter's and their Structure) (1899), and Sharp's (Insects' (Vols. I and II, of Cambridge Natural History) (1895-99), contains a résumé of general information and of modern views as to relationships, phylogeny, etc. A good refer ence book for the British species is Newman, L. W., and Leeds, H. F., 'Text-Book of British Butterflies and Moths' (Saint Albans 1913). The best general illustrated descriptive work on North American species is W. J. Holland's The Moth Book' (New York 1903), which contains an extensive classified list of books relating to the whole subject, including the splendid mono graphs of American families by Packard, Grote, Smith, Beutenmilller, Hu1st, Dyar and others. Among the more or less popular works treat ing of the moths are Dickerson, Mary C., 'Moths and Butterflies' (Boston 1901) • Robert son-Miller, Edith, 'Butterfly and Moth Book' (New York 1912); Stratton-Porter, G., 'Moths of the Limberlost' (New York 1912).