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Dudusa synopla Swinhoe
sp. rev.
Dudusa
synopla Swinhoe,
1907, Ann. Mag. nat. Hist. (7) 19: 205.
Dudusa
synopla Swinhoe;
Kiriakoff 1968: 22, as synonym of the younger name, fumosa
Matsumura.
Dudusa
nobilis Walker,
sensu Holloway 1976: 55.
Diagnosis. See Dudusa vethi Snellen stat.
rev.
Geographical range. Indian Subregion, Burma, Sumatra, Borneo.
Habitat preference. Only two specimens have been taken, one in hill
dipterocarp forest at 300 m in Ulu Temburong, Brunei, and one in tall upper
montane forest at 1930 m on G. Kinabalu.
Biology. Bell (1935) published an account of the life history of this species but
identified it as nobilis; the illustrations of the adult indicate that it
is in fact synopla. The head of the larva is brownish red, the surface of
the body smooth, dull, with black-ended yellow spines on each segment, the four
most anterior and posterior being larger than the rest. The spines are much
longer dorsally than laterally. The body colour is pale yellow with a red collar
and red on the prolegs and clasper. The second and third thoracic segments are
dorsally, anteriorly, velvety black (cf. Gaede's description of a Tarsolepis larva,
above). The spiracular area has longitudinal black streaks and there is a
whitish subspiracular band.
The larvae are found high up on trees of Schleichera trijuga (Sapindaceae)
in India. They lie on the undersides of the leaves, eating the mature ones when
in later instars. They descend to pupate below the surface of the soil in an
earthen cell that is smoothed inside but not lined with silk. Bell recorded a
period of eight months from larvae going down to the emergence of the adult.
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