Page:Life-histories of Indian insects - Microlepidoptera - T. Bainbrigge Fletcher.djvu/96

 T. BAINBRIGUE FLETCHER 27 Life-history. The egg is oval in outline, round in section, measuring about half a millimetre in length. It is, when laid, light green or bluish, be- coming yellower as it aj)proaches hatching. Eggs are laid at night, each egg singly, several being found on each young pod, fliwer-bud or young leaf. They are difficult to find and escape notice unless one knows what they are like and is looking specially for them. Eggs hatch in three and a half to four days in warm weather, in five to six days in the winter in the Plains. The larva simply bites a hole in the egg and craM^ls out, leaving the empty white egg-shell which it does not eat. (Plate VII, figs. 1, 2.) Larva. The newly-hatched insect is about one millimetre long, yellow, LonA^'^ i>M/<i^"u";e^ the segments covered with short hairs. As it grows older the colour becomes ?/ ^^.|» uJ"i^ J| green, or green with brown markings, closely resembling the colouring oi the ( ^^^^^^i] Rem pod it is feeding on. The segments are clothed in hairs and capitate spines, A^^^t^ ^ p,^ (IT c^ the latter in distinct rosettes. There are five pairs of green prolegs. (Plate (w"^, K j'^'^ VII, fig. 3.) The larva, on hatching, eats into the pod and feeds upon. Tu^c. 15^ the seeds ; or it bites into the unopened flower-bud and attacks the developing anthers. It never actually goes completely into the pod but stretches in from outside. This caterpillar is much like that of Sphenarches caffer and is found abundantly with it upon the buds and pods of pigeon-pea in the cold weather. The larval life lasts for ] 6 to 21 days in warm weather, from 25 to 30 days in the cold weather. Pupa. Pupation takes place on the plant, openly. The manner of pupation is the same as that of SpJienarches caffer, and the pupa is similarly attached at two points to the silken pod by means of circinate spines forming two cremastral pads, one at the anal extremity and the other on the lower surface of the eighth abdom.inal segm^ent. It is green, grey, or brown, and is, like the larva, cryptically coloured. The pupal period is from, three to five days in the hot weather, seven days in the cold weather. (Plate VII, fig. 5.) Emergence from the pupa is effected by the rupture of the pupal integument along the median line from the vertex to the end of the midventral line of the thorax. The moth is shown in Plate VII, fig. 6 ; the wings are noimally held so that only the narrow forewing is visible. It is found flying in the dusk, resting by day on the lower surface of a leaf or on any convenient surface. Mating may take place soon after emergence, and oviposition the next night ; even in captivity without food the moths survive for ten days. In the insectary one moth laid a total of 9-1 fertile eggs, laying over thirty the first night, the remainder on four subsequent ni";hts.'