This sugaring business is perhaps the most exciting phase of collecting.
Having prepared a fine compound of coarse brown or "foots" sugar, treacle,
and beer, by boiling down these ingredients to a suitable liquid condition,
this is taken to the scene of action in a sugaring tin, a receptacle fitted
with a brush which is fixed in the screw-on top; or the attracting medium
may be carried in any kind of convenient bottle providing a paintbrush
(sash tool) and a jampot or some such article accompany it. Arrived on the
ground, preferably a wood, a ride is selected along each side of which are
convenient trees. A glade such as that in the New Forest, photographed by
Mr. W. J. Lucas, and reproduced in Fig. 12, is an ideal pitch. Just before
using, a very small quantity of rum may be added to the mixture, but if
"foots" can be obtained the rum is not required. In the autumn I have found
a drop or two of the essence of {12} jargonelle pear, or of ribstone
pippin, an effective addition. Now comes the initial stage in the night's
venture, the "sugar" is put on each tree in a streak extending downwards
about a foot from the level of one's chin; if thin enough to spread easily
the mixture is almost certain to run further down the trunk. Whilst
employed in this somewhat messy preliminary we meditate on the possible
result, and hope that if visitors are not numerous they may at least be
select. Lighting the lantern, the first round of inspection of the sugar
patches is made, but this may not be altogether encouraging; on only one
tree are there any moths and these but three in number, and not uncommon
kinds (see Fig. 13). The second and even the third rounds do not {13} give
the satisfactory results we had anticipated, and we feel inclined to retire
discomfited; but as a sort of forlorn hope we try once again, and this time
we secure one or two really good things. Another night moths arrive quite
early and in large numbers, chiefly commoners, but with a sprinkling of the
better sorts among them. Just what meteorological or other conditions are
most conducive to a successful sugaring expedition I have never been able
to ascertain. Often blanks have been drawn when the weather has seemingly
been the most favourable, and quite as frequently good bags have been made
when exactly the reverse was thought to be more likely. If the natural
attractions {14} in the way of flowers and "honey dew" abound, the insects
may possibly ignore the most tempting bait we can contrive for them. There
is much uncertainty in this favourite method of collecting, and whether
sugar is put on tree trunks, foliage, palings, rocks, or stones, or smeared
on rags, and these hung up on barbed wire fences; or daubed on heads of
thistles or bunches of grass heads tied together, one must be prepared to
accept the disappointments that are inevitable, however careful we may be
in the selection of "suitable evenings." It may be added that newly sugared
trees are generally less attractive than those that are frequently painted
with the mixture.
[Illustration: FIG. 14.