Scent Organs.

Star (Christchurch), Volume LXVI, Issue 20366, 25 July 1934, Page 6

Scent Organs.

Nature Notes

By James Drummond, F.L.S., F.Z.S. JTEW ZEALAND is the headquarters of the most primitive 'moths known, the micro-pterygidae, a title that means the small-winged family. The expansion of their wings is only about a quarter of an inch or half an inch, but they are particularly interesting to entomologists. Both sexes in most species of the family have special organs believed by Mr A. Philpott, of Wellington, to be scent organs. In at least some members of the family of the Pieridee, to which the troublesome small white cabbage-butterfly belongs, but which has no native representatives in New Zealand, scent is produced by scentscales on the wings, the common type of scent organ. Entomologists, apparently, have not noted scent-scales on the whitewinged insect, Pieri rapae, that has caused consternation here. The scent organ of some butterflies is a tiny bag lined with hairs and carried at. the end of the body. It can l>e extruded at will. This action turns it inside out, and it becomes a brush. Scented material is swept out from beneath scales on the body. Impregnated with the material, the brush diffuses the scent. The attachment then is withdrawn into its little bag. Very fine filaments are found in some I.'rushes. The filaments break up into dust, and the brushes become powderpuffs. A male with this type of scent organ was seen hovering over a female and dusting her with perfumed powder. Males of one group of butterflies have four brushes. Two of these produce scent, the other two distributing.