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96
Journal of the Lepidopterists' Society
but the illustrations are of good quality and clarity. In conjunction with the keys, the reader should be able to identify any Malaysian butterfly from the species illustrated on the plates.
In short, this book should be on the shelves of anyone with an interest in the butterflies of this region, even if he has another edition of Corbet and Pendlebury. Eliot has done a fine revision that would make both Corbet and Pendlebury happy to have their names associated with, and nothing finer can be said about a revision of an older book.
Lee D. Miller, Allyn Museum of Entomology, 3701 Bay Shore Road, Sarasota, Florida 33580.
Journal of the Lepidopterists' Society 37(1), 1983, 96
The Cutworm Moths of Ontario and Quebec by Eric W. Rockburne and J. Donald Lafontaine, with photographs by Thomas H. Stovell. 1976. Agriculture Canada, Research Branch, Publication 1593. 164 pp., 613 col. figs. Obtainable from Canadian Government Publication Centre, Supply and Services Canada, Hull, Quebec K1A 0S9. $US 10.50, $CAN 8.50.
This hard-bound, lavishly illustrated little book is primarily a collection of life-size colored illustrations of noctuid moths from the Agaristinae to the Catocalinae (in the sequence of the McDunnough, 1938, check list), intended as an identification guide for the amateur. It has a brief text of usually three or four lines per species, giving distribution within the two provinces, food plants, and flight period, and a 5-page introduction consisting of elementary information on classification, life history, adult structure, and collecting. It treats all Noctuidae represented by specimens from Ontario or Quebec in the Canadian National Collection with the exception of the Hypeninae, Rivulinae, and Herminiinae (in the sense of McDunnough). My only complaint about the book is that these latter three also could have been covered with the addition of only two and one-half pages to the 41 pages of illustrations already included, making it a nearly complete guide to the Noctuidae of that region. The term "cutworm moths" is construed as encompassing such a large part of the Noctuidae that it might just as well have been applied to them all.
This book is essentially without errors, and the nomenclature is current as of the time of publication. The colored illustrations are not perfect, but they would have to be regarded as adequate to excellent when one considers the modest price. The original photographs, made against the traditional pale-blue background by the same photographer who did the illustrations for the Butterflies and Moths of Newfoundland and Labrador, were obviously very well done. As in the work just cited, the legends give no locality data, but the stated purpose of Rockburne and Lafontaine was only to produce "a handbook intended for amateurs." Also, I could see nothing in the illustrations to reveal that the figured specimens were from anywhere other than Ontario or Quebec.
I do not hesitate to recommend this book as a useful aid to the identification of noctuid moths of the Northeast and suspect that it will find an important place on the bookshelves of many entomologists who do not think of themselves as amateurs.
Douglas C. Ferguson, Systematic Entomology Laboratory, IIBIII, Agricultural Research Service, U.S.D.A., % U.S. National Museum of Natural History, Washington, D.C. 20560.
Date of Issue (Vol. 37, No. 1): 19 August 1983