Miscellaneous Genera II
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Hyperlopha Hampson

Type species: cristifera Walker, Sri Lanka.

Synonym:
Hyperlophoides Strand (type species compactilis Swinhoe, Burma, Peninsular Malaysia; also Taiwan according to Heppner & Inoue (1992)). Poole (1989) and Heppner & Inoue (1992) treated this genus separately, but the type species is closely allied to H. discontenta Walker.

The forewing shape of
Hyperlopha species has some resemblance to that of several other genera such as Thalatta Walker and the Scoliopterygini (p. 213) where the hindwings are much plainer than the forewings, and to other genera such as Lycimna Walker where the hindwing pattern resembles that of the forewing to a greater extent. The apex is falcate and there is usually an angle or at least stronger curvature at the centre of the distal margin. However, the facies is distinguished by the strong development of an area of darker marks or white spots submarginally over the posterior half of the wing. In sexually dimorphic species, this is more apparent in females. The rest of the fasciation is generally more obscure, usually fine and irregular. The male antennae are variable: dentatefasciculate in the type species; narrowly and densely fasciculate in H. discontenta Walker; ciliate in flavipennis Holloway. The labial palps are typical of the catocalines.

The male abdomen shows a similar diversity of structure. Prominent hair pencils are present on each side of the basal sternite in
discontenta, and much weaker ones are present in compactilis and the cristifera group, but these are not of the ‘trifine’ type, lacking a lever and Stobbe’s glands, nor being enclosed in pouches (Holloway, 1989). There is a pair of flaps within the diaphragm between the first and second tergites. In the eighth segment, the tergite can be cleft deeply fore and aft to give it a distinct ‘H’ or ‘X’ shape, and the sternite is shallow but broad. In the genitalia, the uncus has a diversity of shapes and supplementary processes, and the tegumen may also be modified. The tegumen is much longer than the vinculum except in flavipennis. The valves are distally simple, tonguelike, or broadening into a curved paddle or sickle. The saccus is complex, with angles and spines or other processes that continue across the centre of the valve with involvement of the juxta. The juxta may be of the inverted ‘V’ type, but its modification makes this hard to interpret: in the cristifera group, it resembles a broad, inverted tripod and shows some bilateral asymmetry. The aedeagus is diversely shaped, but the vesica is usually simple, often globular, scobinate, or with small cornuti or groups of cornuti.

The female genitalia have a variably complex sterigma within the ring of the eighth segment; this is most strongly modified in the cristifera group. The structure of the ductus and bursa varies, but the latter contains a short longitudinal band of scobination. The seventh segment is unmodified.

The genus extends in moderate diversity for the Indian Subregion to Australia and Samoa. There are four species described from Madagascar (Poole, 1989), but these, according to original descriptions and material in BMNH, have bipectinate male antennae and lack the diagnostic facies characters noted above. They appear to form a natural group that is probably misplaced in
Hyperlopha. The two species described from Indochina, H. bigoti Berio and H. catenata Berio, appear to be yellow as in flavipennis but lacking the subtornal white marks of the forewing and having fasciated hindwings. Both were described from single females.

The type species was reared from the egg by Bell (MS). The egg is a dome, broader than high, pale honey-yellow, blotched all over with red and orange. The larva was described as ophiusine in shape, though A8 was only slightly tumid transversely, and the dorsolateral tubercles were not conspicuous. The prolegs on A4 are reduced, those of A3 more so. The head is brown, spotted irregularly in white but with some bilateral symmetry. The body is variably smoky green, mossy green or olive green, marbled with white dots and lines that form a rough double dorsal band centred with a thin straight line of ground colour. There is a similar but broader band exterior to this, and an even broader spiracular one. The setae rise from pink spots, those subdorsally on A2 being larger. The ventral surface is green, lined darker.

The eggs are laid under tender, young leaves, and the larvae remain on the undersides. Pupation is in a close fitting cell of silk incorporating detritus on the ground or just within a crevice. The pupa lacks a powdery bloom.

The host plant is
Diospyros (Ebenaceae).

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