Page:The birds of Tierra del Fuego - Richard Crawshay.djvu/50

xxx Dark Clouded Yellow (Colias cunnighami), whose female is constantly pale.

Moths are more plentiful. Of these. Sir George Hampson observes that they are what might be expected to occur, being allied to the insects of the higher Andes with a close parallel to the fauna of New Zealand. Families represented are principally Noctuidæ, Geometridæ, and Pyralidæ, with a few Tortricidæ, Tineidæ, Saturnidæ, and Hepialidæ. The only family apparently absent which would naturally be looked for is that of the Arctiadæ.

The Moths are throughout remarkable for sombre plumage. Not one in my collection has any vivid colouring. The commonest species, perhaps, is a Geometrid, Lissopsis virgellata, whose ghostly forms flitting in all directions enhance the gloom of night. An insect which interested me more than any is a tiny day-flying Noctuid, Anarta trisema, taken in bright sunshine at the same time as the Fritillary. Feltia clerica is a fairly large and handsome Noctuid, of nocturnal habit, likely to be remarked as something out of the ordinary. A large Swift, near to or may be identical with Hepialus luteicornis, of which I obtained a single example, is the largest Moth taken by me. A small Swift (H. fuscus) is fairly abundant.

With all there was to do in other ways, 1 could not undertake the systematic collecting of Diptera. Hardly is it possible to arrive at any correct estimate of this order from the results achieved by other expeditions, as the collecting done hitherto in the island is of too scanty a nature, with the exception of the collection made by the French Mission to Cape Horn—and in his work on this. Bigot records no localities. Provisionally, the following families may be taken to occur:—Muscidae (House-Flies. Blue-Bottles, etc.); Syrphidæ (Hover- Flies); Dolicliopodidæ; Empidae; Tabanidæ (Horse-Flies); Rhyphidæ; Tipididæ (Crane Flies); Limnohidæ; Psychodidæ; Chironomidæ (Midges); Bihionidæ; Mycetophilidæ (Fungus Midges). Cidicidæ (Gnats or Mosquitos) appear to be absent.