A FLORAL MOTH-TRAP.

Temuka Leader, Issue 1899, 1 June 1889, Page 3

A FLORAL MOTH-TRAP.

Messrs Adams and Sons have forwarded to us some specimens of white tubular flowers with moths entrapped in them. The plant which produces these flowers would be a boon to orchardists, and should be grown by them to aid in reducing the number of catepillars which, in some seasons, are very injurious to fruit trees. Their correspondent, Mr Field, of Wanganui, writes as follows:—“I send some blossoms of the curious moth-catching plant to which I drew attention a year or two ago. It is a climbing plant, and the blossoms are very sweet-scented, particularly at night, the moths plunge their trunks into the nectaries of the flower to get the honey, and being unable to withdraw them are held prisoners till they die. At this season there are very few moths to be caught, but in summer and autumn hundreds are captured every night on each plant, so that in the morning there they are fluttering their wings in their efforts to escape. The little fantails found out my plant this summer, and visited them for their breakfast every morning, so that the captured moths get mostly eaten by mid-day. The plant begins to blioom early in November, and continues to do so until the sharp frosts come at the end of winter.” The plant is a half-hardy evergreen climber from Buenos Ayres, and named Aranja alba or physianthus. Its popular name is the white bladder blower. I/yttelton Times.