This species (Plate [155], Fig. 1), known also as asiliformis, Rottemburg (1775), and cynipiformis, Esper (1782), is now held to be correctly referred to vespiformis, Linnæus (1761). The crossbar of the fore wings is orange red in both sexes; the body of the male has two more or less united yellow spots at the junction with the thorax, four yellow belts, and the tail tuft is black above, mixed with yellow below; in the female the body belts are usually one less than in the male, the yellow spots at the junction are generally run together, and the tail tuft is almost wholly yellow. As indicated by the English name, the legs are largely yellow in both sexes.
The caterpillar feeds on the inner bark of oak trees, is full
grown in May or June, and turns to a brownish chrysalis in a cell formed in the bark. A well-known locality for this moth, which is out in July and early August, is Hyde Park, London. It is also found in woods or oak-timbered parks in Kent (Tunbridge Wells), Surrey, Sussex (Abbot's Wood, Tilgate, etc.), Dorset (Glanvilles Wootton, etc.), Devon (Devonport, Plymouth, Topsham, etc.), Essex (Epping), Suffolk, Oxfordshire, Gloucestershire, Leicestershire, Staffordshire, and Yorkshire (Doncaster).
Red-belted Clearwing (Sesia myopæformis).
One example of each sex is shown on Plate [155], where Fig. 2 represents the male and Fig. 3 the female; both have a single belt on the body; as a rule, the belt is red, but occasionally it inclines to orange or yellow.
The caterpillar feeds on the inner bark of the trunks or boughs of apple, and sometimes pear, trees. It is nearly two years in maturing, but is full grown about June. The moth is out during the summer months, and is to be seen early on sunny mornings, newly emerged from the chrysalis on the trunks of the trees in which the caterpillar lives; the chrysalis skins will also be noted at the same time, sticking out from holes in the bark. Later in the day it sits on leaves, etc., after its flights, and I have even found it occasionally on a gravel path, and once on the pavement of a road in North-west London.
The species seems to be most frequent in gardens and orchards around London, but it has been recorded from as far north as Lancashire and Yorkshire; it is probably widely distributed over England. The Irish localities, mentioned by Kane, are Dublin, Cork, Killarney, and Clonbrock.
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