|
Decetia Walker
Type species: capetusaria Walker = numicusaria Walker,
Indian Subregion. Synonym: Aoratosema Warren (type species subflavata Warren).
The facies is typically somewhat drepanid-like as in most members of the
subfamily. The antennae are unipectinate in both sexes.
The male genitalia are very variable in form but usually robust, with a
strong saccus and the valves apically divided, usually with a single spine at
the apex. The juxta and anellar ring are fused, with lateral setose lobes
centrally and dorsally, though these are variable in development.
In the female there is similar variability, particularly in modification
to the sterigma and lamellae vaginales. The ductus varies from long, slender to
short and round, and the bursa is ovate or convolute with a signum consisting of
a pair of adjacent patches or bands of sclerotisation, with spines directed away
from their common axis. This signum can be short, ovate (the pallidaria Pagenstecher
group and subflavata Warren) or long, narrow, cruciform in the typical
group (illustrated for dichromataria Walker in Fig 177).
|
|
Bell (MS) reared D. subobscurata in S. India. The larva is fusiform, fattest centrally, tapering to each end, though the anal end is
somewhat tumid. The segments are well-defined. The head is relatively small,
squarely round. The larva is light green with white longitudinal bands
subdorsally and laterally, with blackish speckling between the lateral bands and
the white-ringed spiracles, this speckling intense from A1 to A7. T1 has black
subdorsal crescents, concave anteriorly, and the head has two transverse black
bands.
The pupa is claviform, the cremaster with four pairs of hooked shaftlets,
the central pair stouter and longer than the rest. These attach the pupa to a
loose silken cocoon. The larva also lives between leaves drawn together loosely
with silk.
The host-plant was Olax wightiana (Olacaceae).
<<Back
>>Forward <<Return
to Contents page
|
