Genus NEOMINOIS, Scudder
Butterfly.—Medium-sized, with the costa and inner margin of the fore wing straight, the outer margin of the same wing evenly rounded. The hind wings have the outer margin evenly rounded, and the costal margin quite strongly produced, or bent at an angle, just above the origin of the costal vein. The inner margin is straight. The costal vein of the fore wing is slightly swollen. The costal margin at the extremity of the second costal nervule is slightly bent inward; the upper discocellular vein is wanting; the lower radial vein is emitted from the lower discocellular a little below the point at which it unites with the middle discocellular. The middle discocellular of the hind wing appears as an inward continuation of the lower radial for some distance, when it bends upward suddenly to the origin of the upper radial. The head is small; the antennæ are short, with a thin, gradually developed club; the palpi are slender, compressed, well clothed with long hairs below.
[a]Fig. 120.]—Neuration of the genus Neominois, enlarged.
Egg.—The egg is somewhat barrel-shaped, broader at the base than at the top, with the summit rounded. The sides are ornamented with fourteen or fifteen vertical raised ridges, which are quite broad, and sometimes fork or run into each other. On the sides these ridges seem to be regularly excised at their bases, and between them on the surface are many horizontal raised cross-lines, giving the depressed surface the appearance of being filled with shallow cells.
Caterpillar.—The mature caterpillar has the head globular, the body cylindrical, gradually tapering backward, and provided with two very short conical anal horns.
Chrysalis.—The chrysalis is formed under the surface of the earth; it is rounded, somewhat carinate, or keel-shaped, where the wing-cases unite on the ventral side. The head is rounded, the thorax strongly arched, the dorsal side of the abdomen very convex. On either side of the head are small clusters of fine processes shaped somewhat like an Indian club, the thickened part studded with little spur-like projections. These can only be seen under the microscope.
But two species of the genus are known within our faunal limits.
(1) Neominois ridingsi, Edwards, Plate XXV, Fig. 15, ♂ (Ridings' Satyr).
Butterfly.—The upper side is well depicted in the plate. The under side is paler than the upper side, and the basal and median areas of both wings are profusely mottled with narrow pale-brown striæ, the secondaries crossed by a darker mesial band, the outer margin of which is sharply indented. Expanse, 1.50 inch.