I have also found spotless white eggs in 2 different years in the same tree in which the Cream coloured Rook was first observed & probably hatched.²

You may be glad to hear that in this county we have a local race of Yellowish white Moles (I received 12 from one parish) they vary much in size of bones & number of ribs &.c. We also have in another part of the county a local race of black moles with large yellow spots (generally only one spot on each specimen), & occasional varieties of rusty grey & brown moles.³

With regard to migration of species I have observed that the larger Waterbeetles & Newts in my aquarium frequently have one foot caught by a small freshwater bivalve (cyclas cornea?) which they swim about with in a very restless state day & night for several days until the foot or toe is completely severed. Waterbeetles migrate through the air (& frequently fall on our glazed Cucumber-frame, probably mistaking it for water). Newts migrate by land at night crossing considerable obstacles, climbing trees, bushes, heather &.c.⁴ The bivalve might migrate with them.

I have read several records of several species of Birds shot or caught with cockles & other bivalves similarly attached to their toes & bills; so cockles & other bivalves might migrate with them.

The beautiful red & green parasitic crabs which I have found in living cockles might perhaps migrate thus with the cockles & the birds.⁵

Now, as to mimicry— until last summer my own experience & that of my moth collecting friends led me to consider the ♀ Euthemonia Russula about 100 times rarer (or more difficult to find) than the ♂. One day last summer I caught 6 ♀s on the wing in an hour or 2 & I believe I saw several other ♀s that day but did not recognize them. My chief difficulty in catching them was that I could seldom distinguish them (on the wing) from Argynnis selene which was then flying in abundance & even when I did distinguish a ♀ Russula, it was very difficult to run it down or to mark it down through such a maze of Selene, Sylvanus, Linea, Pamphilus & other bright chestnut coloured butterflies.⁶ The ♀ Russula flies low & rapidly   The ♂ Russula flies slowly & irregularly generally rising to a good height & then down to pitch among the heather. Thus the ♂ is from its peculiar flight & pale buff colour very conspicuous.

Larvæ of Notodonta Ziczac feed in Foxley Wood on Aspen & on the Broad leaved Sallow, but these larvæ on Aspen are of a brownish black (like indiarubber) & the Aspen leaf when dead or injured turns the same colour, whilst those larvæ which feed on the Broad leaved Sallow are of an orange colour & resemble the recurved under surface of those leaves which (in the broad leaved Sallow) are so frequently turned orange on the under surface by a fungus (Sphæria?)⁷

The imago of Notodonta Camelina⁸ is of a dull dark brown when the larva has fed on oak, but when the larva of Camelina has fed on Broad leaved Sallow the imago is of an orange brown colour. I do not know if these varieties are constant.

You are probably aware that the Redbacked Shrike impales large numbers of Humble bees alive on thorns near its nest.⁹ All these humble bees that I have observed so impaled were females, & I have examined a good many. Several species of Bombus were represented. Your experiments with regard to fertilization of Red Clover by Humble bees is very interesting indeed. I have often wondered if your trial was exhaustive i.e. whether you proved that neither Colias Edusa, Cynthia Cardui, Plusia gamma, nor any one of the myriads of other insects which swarm in Clover fields by day & by night are able to fertilize Red Clover.¹⁰

In your “Fertilization of Orchids” p. 198 you say “English sphinxes have probosces as long as their bodies”.¹¹ As you may be glad to know that some moths have probosces longer than their bodies, I have just measured the bodies & probosces of some dried specimens in my cabinet—

(British) Sphinx Convolvuli

length of body 2 inches, proboscis 3$\frac{1}{2}$ inches

(Virginian) Sphinx (Carolina?)

length of body 2 inches, proboscis over 3 inches¹²

These specimens have been thoroughly baked in a hot oven & I have no doubt that when living these moths could extend their probosces to the length of 4 inches or more.

Yours truly | Frank Norgate