Polypogon
pallexa
sp. n. Mixomelia palumbina Butler sensu Prout, 1928, Sarawak Mus. J. 3: 476.
Polypogon pallexa
Figure 318
10mm, 11mm. The wings are a very pale bone colour with sharply defined, fine, blackish fasciation, more or less restricted to a straight submarginal on the forewing and a similar one with a fainter postmedial on the hindwing, both of these latter being obtusely angled near the dorsum in the typical herminiine manner. There is a dark reniform spot on the forewing. This facies type is seen also in P. palumbina and P. duplexa Moore, both from India. The forewing postmedial is more crenulate, less angled, and the oblique discal mark is broader (see also Prout (loc. cit.)); the ground colour is more brownish in tint. The facies is closer to that of duplexa but with more clearly defined markings that are less obscured by a diffusion of dark scales. The male foreleg has the tarsus reduced to one segment, possibly with a vestige of a second, extending two-thirds of the length of the sheath. The male eighth abdominal segment has a moderate framed corematous structure but no actual corema. The uncus is long, slender, rod-like. The valve is narrow with an acute apex and an acute process at the centre of, and directed away from, the costa. The juxta has a spiny margin as in the type species of Lysimelia Walker (see p. 135). The aedeagus is short, and there is a massive cornutus with a bulbous base at the base of the vesica, which is also ringed with coarse spines. The vesica is lobed distally, with fine scobination on two of the lobes. These features are seen also in palumbina, but this species has a deeper uncus, the costal process of the valve is more distal, and there is a more distinctly angular one on the sacculus. The spining of the juxta is only weak and more central in palumbina. The bulbous cornutus of the aedeagus has a shorter spine in palumbina, with a comb of four short spines adjacent to it.
Holotype. SARAWAK: Gunong Mulu Nat. Park, R.G.S. Exped. 1977-8 (J.D. Holloway et al.), Site 13, February, Camp 2, Mulu, 500m, 401464, mixed dipt. for., BM noctuid slide 19432.
Paratypes (general data as holotype): 1 Site 10, February, Camp 1, Mulu, 160m. 386470, mixed dipt. for.; 1 (slide 20188; foreleg) Site 16, March, Long Pala, Base, 70m. 413461, alluv. / second. for.; 1 Site 19, March, W. Melinau Gorge, 100m, 427567, alluvial forest; 1 Site 24, April, W. Melinau Gorge, 270m, 430658, FEG 4, limestone forest.
Geographical range. Borneo.
Habitat preference. Five specimens were taken in a variety of lowland forest types up to 500m during the Mulu survey. Prout (see above) recorded a single female from G. Murud.
11mm. The wings are a very pale bone colour with sharply defined, fine, blackish fasciation, more or less restricted to a straight submarginal on the forewing and a similar one with a fainter postmedial on the hindwing, both of these latter being obtusely angled near the dorsum in the typical herminiine manner. There is a dark reniform spot on the forewing. This facies type is seen also in P. palumbina and P. duplexa Moore, both from India. The forewing postmedial is more crenulate, less angled, and the oblique discal mark is broader (see also Prout (loc. cit.)); the ground colour is more brownish in tint. The facies is closer to that of duplexa but with more clearly defined markings that are less obscured by a diffusion of dark scales. The male foreleg has the tarsus reduced to one segment, possibly with a vestige of a second, extending two-thirds of the length of the sheath. The male eighth abdominal segment has a moderate framed corematous structure but no actual corema. The uncus is long, slender, rod-like. The valve is narrow with an acute apex and an acute process at the centre of, and directed away from, the costa. The juxta has a spiny margin as in the type species of Lysimelia Walker (see p. 135). The aedeagus is short, and there is a massive cornutus with a bulbous base at the base of the vesica, which is also ringed with coarse spines. The vesica is lobed distally, with fine scobination on two of the lobes. These features are seen also in palumbina, but this species has a deeper uncus, the costal process of the valve is more distal, and there is a more distinctly angular one on the sacculus. The spining of the juxta is only weak and more central in palumbina. The bulbous cornutus of the aedeagus has a shorter spine in palumbina, with a comb of four short spines adjacent to it.