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SUBFAMILY
PANTHEINAE |
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Belciana viridipicta Hampson (Plate 1, Figs 27, 28) Ancara viridipicta Hampson, 1902, J. Bombay nat. Hist. Soc., 14: 202. Diagnosis. The facies has all the elements of the species discussed above, except the dark patches, fasciation and suffusion are much more extensive as illustrated. It is most similar to kala Prout, but with less angled antemedial and postmedial boundaries to the medial green zone of the forewing. The hindwing is a more uniform brown, grading slightly paler basad, rather than pale yellow with a brown border. Taxonomic note. Poole (1989) placed this species in Chlorognesia Warren (type species glaucochlora Hampson, Himalaya), following the original description of that genus and its component species. The facies of the wings and the structure of the male genitalia are more consistent with placement in Belciana or Donda. The uncus is slender, flexed strongly downwards subbasally in Chlorognesia but straight distal to the flexure except for a slight apical hook. There is a prominent coat-hook process in the centre of the valve at the interior edge of the sacculus. The juxta is pinched up centrally into a dorsoventrally oriented ridge. The aedeagus vesica is irregularly pyriform and bears a large, somewhat triangular sclerite. In viridipicta the uncus is long, narrow, but has a strong central flexure placing basal and distal sections almost at right angles to each other. The valves are much narrower than in Chlorognesia, with a strong costa and an upturned, slightly paddle-like apex with a coronal field of setae. The sacculus bears a small, slender, triangular process at about one third along the valve that points across at the costa. The juxta lacks any ridge. The aedeagus vesica bears numerous long, slender, almost ribbon-like spines that are directed towards the junction with the aedeagus. Neither taxon has coremata on the valve. The reversed spines on the aedeagus vesica and the saccular structure of viridipicta are seen also in striatovirens, but this has a framed corematous eighth segment. Belciana kala has these features more weakly, but the extensive field of setae over the valve is as in D. striatovirens rather than restricted to the apex as in viridipicta. There are small basal coremata on the valves of kala but not in viridipicta; however, striatovirens does have the male eighth segment unmodified as in Chlorognesia. The female genitalia have the ostium at the posterior margin of the seventh sternite as in Donda Moore (see above) but with a simpler sclerotised, funnel‑like antrum leading from the broad opening into a distal section of the ductus bursae that is narrow, corrugated, expanding slightly, and strongly sinuous at the junction with the corpus bursae. The corpus bursae is spherical, with extensive corrugation. The ductus seminalis arises from the centre of one side. Geographical range. N.E. Himalaya, Burma, Thailand (Kononenko & Pinratana, 2005), Peninsular Malaysia, Sumatra, Borneo. Habitat preference. A single Bornean specimen has been seen (illustrated), a female from Sandakan on the coast of Sabah. |
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