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Earias flavida Felder
Earias flavida Felder, 1861, Sber. Akad. Wiss. Wien, 43: 34.
Digba
uninotata
Walker, 1862, J. Linn. Soc. (Zool.), 6: 198.
Earias annulifera Walker, 1866, List Specimens lepid. Insects Colln Br.
Mus., 35: 1774.
Earias sulphuraria Moore, 1887, Lep. Ceylon, 3: 490.
Earias flavida Felder; Holloway, 1976: 22; Kobes, 1997: 51.
Diagnosis.
The forewings are bright yellow,
grading paler basad. There is a faintly darker reniform and even fainter,
punctate, antemedial and postmedial fasciae. The
species is
always smaller than mjoebergi Prout. Another widespread and similar
species, E.
luteolaria
Hampson, may prove to occur in Borneo. It is distinguished from flavida
by the reddish margin and fringes to the forewing. It is treated by Kobes
(1997).
Geographical range. Indo-Australian tropics east to Samoa and Tonga.
Habitat preference. Though never common, the species can be found over a
wide range of habitats and altitudes from the lowlands to 1930m.
Biology. Bell (MS) described the life history in India. The larva is
claviform at rest, spindle-shaped when in motion. The claviform shape is derived
from contraction of the anterior segments to produce tumidity. Many of the setal
tubercles are prolonged into fleshy, erect, conical processes, giving a spiny
appearance; each is surmounted by a fine hair. The body is covered with a dense
pile of minute hairs that also extend over the spiny tubercles. T1 has a
chitinised collar. The colour is light yellowish brown to smoky black with a
broad, marbled, grey or light brown dorsal band that extends down on either side
to the spiracles on segments A3 and A4, but only to the dorsolateral region on
A5-8. Anterior to A3 there is only a light brown subdorsal band. The venter is
light greenish yellow.
Pupation is in a papery cocoon, thickish brown, ovoid, strongly truncated
anteriorly with a vertical exit slit, and blunt behind. The pupa is ovoid,
terminating in a convex cap with no sign of a cremaster.
The larvae live among young tender leaves and flowers of the host plant, eating
buds and young fruits. The spiny form and the colour camouflage it when amongst
the flowers.
The host plant was Grewia (Tiliaceae).
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