As a British insect, this species (Plate [100], Figs. 7 and 8) was first found in Devonshire, and was then known by the English name of "The Devon Pug." As the yellowish green caterpillar, marked with a darker line along the back and a yellowish one low down on the sides, feeds on bilberry, in April and May, and is by no means confined to Devonshire, the popular name here adopted is more suitable.
When quite fresh the moth, which is out in June and July, has a very delicate tinge of green, but this quickly fades out, leaving a pale greyish white insect. In the typical form (Fig. 7) the black central lines are fairly well defined, but in ab. nigropunctata, Chant (Fig. 8), the lines are represented by a series of dots.
The species is common in some of the sheltered hollows among the hills in Devon and Somerset, and I used to find it in abundance in the Martinhoe district, in the former county. The moths were rarely disturbed from the food plant during the day, but towards dusk they flew in numbers around small trees of mountain ash. Other counties in which it is known to occur are—England: Cornwall, Worcester, Staffordshire, Leicester, and Lancashire (formerly on Chat Moss). Wales: Glamorgan and Pembroke. Scotland: Aberdeen. Ireland: Wicklow, Waterford, Cork, Kerry, and Sligo.
Dentated Pug (Collix sparsata).
At one time this greyish brown species (Plate [102], Figs. 1, 2) was known by the English name of "Broom Scallop," but it is now usually referred to, in the vulgar tongue, as the Dentated Pug. The hind wings have their outer margins toothed rather than scalloped, and the insect has nothing to do with broom.
The rather long caterpillar is pale green, with four white lines along the back, and one on each side; a whitish stripe along the black spiracles. Head, pale brown, rather flat above. (Adapted from Porritt.) It feeds on the yellow loosestrife (Lysimachia vulgaris), in July and August, or even later. Fens and marshy woodlands are the haunts of the moth, which is out in June and early July. It hides among the coarser vegetation, and is not always easily disturbed therefrom; neither is it often noticed when on the wing at night, although it is sometimes found at the flowers of buckthorn.
Localities for the species are the fens of Cambridge and Norfolk, the boggy parts of the New Forest, Hants; Dorset (Bloxworth and Hyde, etc.); Cheshire (Delamere Forest); Yorkshire (bogs near York, and Thorne Waste).
The range abroad extends to Japan.