Although this common species displays no bright tints, yet it is prettily marked, its whitish wings being peppered and blotched all over with black or very dark brown. It flies in May and June, later than any other species of the family, and may generally be found on fences and tree trunks during the day.
The colour of the caterpillar is very variable—drab, grey, green, or brown; but it may be known by the deep notch in the middle of the head, and the arrangement of its 'humps.' These latter are only small reddish or whitish projections, of which there is one on each side of the fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth, tenth, and eleventh segments; also two on the back of the ninth and twelfth. It feeds in August and September on a large number of trees, including, in fact, nearly all our commonest forest and fruit trees. In September it enters the soil to undergo its change to the chrysalis.
Family—Boarmiidæ
In the next family—Boarmiidæ—there are about twenty British members, most of which are very pretty moths. They differ generally from the last family in that their bodies are more slender,
and although some of them bear a resemblance to species of the family Ennomidæ, their wings are not angulated. In several cases the fore and hind wings are both similarly marked, a feature very uncommon with moths.
The caterpillars of this family usually have humps on the sixth and twelfth segments only, and have two pairs of claspers. The pupæ are to be found either on the ground, among leaves or moss, or beneath the soil.
The Waved Umber (Hemerophila abruptaria)
The most gaily coloured member of this family is the Waved Umber, shown in fig. 6 of [Plate XII]. Like many other Geometræ, it rests on fences and tree trunks by day with wings expanded so that all four are displayed. It is on the wing in May and early June, and again in August, and often frequents our gardens at dusk.
The caterpillar is very dark brown, with a white collar on the front of the second segment. It feeds in June and July on privet (Ligustrum vulgare) and the cultivated rose trees of flower gardens, and probably also on the dog rose (Rosa canina). When full grown it spins a silken cocoon in a fork of one of the twigs, and there undergoes its metamorphoses.