Abstract
MR. A. W. BENNETT'S paper (NATURE, vol. xxiv. p. 501) on the “Constancy of Insects in Visiting Flowers” recalls a note I made at Cromer during the hot weather of last July. On the cliffs west of that town, where flowers were very abundant and of various colours, I carefully watched the movements of a small tortoiseshell butterfly to ascertain what flowers it visited. It was at first busy with bindweed; then it left this for yellow bedstraw (Galium verum), returning presently to bindweed. Then it tried a thistle, which detained it some time, after which it shifted to ragwort, and finally revisited bindweed. It seemed equally busy with all these flowers, though so various in form and colour. My tortoiseshell was therefore less constant than Mr. Bennett's, and its visits were successive, there being no interludes on grass, leaf, tree-trunk, or ground.
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POWELL, J. Constancy of Insects in Visiting Flowers. Nature 24, 509 (1881). https://doi.org/10.1038/024509c0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/024509c0
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