1. Poplar Hawk
2. Poplar Hawk Caterpillar
PLATE XIX
THE POPLAR HAWK (1 and 2)
This is a very handsome moth indeed, which makes its appearance about the end of May or the beginning of June, when you may often see it resting on fences, or on the trunks of poplar trees. After dark, too, you may sometimes see it flying round and round street-lamps; and just now and then it will come into a lighted room through an open window. And in August and the early part of September you may find the caterpillar, which feeds on the leaves of poplar trees, and also on those of willows and laurustinus. It grows to a length of nearly three inches, and is green in colour, sprinkled with yellow. And you can always tell it from that of any other hawk moth by the seven yellow and white stripes on its sides, and also by the yellow horn on its tail. About the middle of September it reaches its full size, and then burrows down into the ground at the roots of the tree on which it has been feeding, and turns to a rough brown chrysalis with a short spike at the end of its body, which always looks as if it had been dipped into very muddy water, and dried without being wiped!
PLATE XX
THE LIME HAWK (1 and 2)
Although it is not quite so large, this is an even handsomer moth than the “poplar hawk,” for its wings are tinted with the most beautiful shades of green and brown and brownish-yellow. When it is resting on a fence or a tree-trunk, indeed, it looks very much like a folded leaf, and you might easily pass it by without noticing it. The caterpillar feeds on the leaves of quite a number of trees, such as lime, and elm, and beech, and birch, and oak. But it much prefers the two first of these, on which you may find it during August and the early part of September. It is green in colour, sprinkled with tiny yellow dots, and has seven yellow stripes on each side, bordered with red. The horn at the end of the body is blue or green above and yellow beneath, and underneath it is a sort of flat horny plate, which is purple in colour, with a yellow edge. About the second week in September it buries itself in the ground and turns to a reddish-brown chrysalis with a spiky tail, out of which the moth hatches towards the end of the following May.
