PLATE XXXVIII1. Spring Usher2. Winter Moth, male3. Winter Moth, female
PLATE XXXVIII
1. Spring Usher2. Winter Moth, male3. Winter Moth, female
This very pretty moth is one of the first to make its appearance after the winter is over, for you may see it resting on fences and walls in March, and sometimes even in February. But you may easily pass it by without noticing it, for it is very fond of sitting among splashes of mud, which it resembles so much that you may look straight at it from a distance of only a few feet, without seeing what it really is. It varies in colour almost as much as the magpie moth, for sometimes it is nearly white all over, and sometimes it is nearly black; but generally the wings are greyish-white, with a few narrow black stripes.
When you see one of these moths, however, you may be quite sure that it is a male; for the female has no wings at all, and looks just like a little greyish-white grub, with six rather long legs. She lays her eggs on the twigs of oak trees, and the little caterpillars hatch out in May. I cannot describe them, for they are all sorts of different colours, so that you may easily find fifteen or twenty, no two of which are quite alike.
This is perhaps the very commonest of all our British moths. It simply swarms in all parts of the country, and on any mild day from the beginning of November till the end of January you may see it in hundreds, resting on fences and tree-trunks. And after dark it visits almost every street-lamp, and sits on the glass gazing at the flame within. But if you want to see the female you must look for her very carefully, for she is a little grub-like creature with hardly any wings at all, very much like that of the “spring usher,” except that she is brown instead of white. You may often find her hiding in the cracks of the bark of fruit trees, to which the caterpillars sometimes do a very great deal of damage.
These caterpillars differ a good deal in colouring, for sometimes they are light green, and sometimes they are dark green, and sometimes they are smoky brown. But they always have a black stripe down the back, and three white ones on either side. There is hardly a tree or a bush on the leaves of which they do not feed, and in May and June you may often see them in thousands and thousands.