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Oreta Walker
Type species: extensa Walker, Java.
Synonyms: Dryopteris Grote (type species rosea Walker, N.
America); Hypsomadius Butler (type species insignis Butler,
Japan); Holoreta Warren (type species jaspidea Warren, Queensland);
Mimoreta Matsumura (type species horishana Matsumura, Taiwan); Oretella
Strand (type species squamulata Strand, Taiwan); Psiloreta Warren
(type species sanguinea Moore, India); Ramphoreta Bryk (type
species eminens Bryk, Burma).
This is a diverse genus of robust, reddish and sometimes partially
yellow species with falcate or, occasionally, bifalcate forewing. It was
reviewed by Watson (1967), with a detailed descriptive section but no clear
statement on definitive apomorphic features. There are features of the male
abdomen that may be definitive: a broad eighth sternite produced laterally
distally into processes that Watson termed apodemes; a well-developed saccus
with the vinculum often expanded laterally; the uncus is broad, rarely, and
usually then only slightly, bilobed; the valves are small, rounded, but with a
large spur or other process from the sacculus. The gnathus is well developed.
The female bursa usually has a small scobinate signum. The ovipositor
lobes are rounded, simple or slightly bilobed, surrounded by sclerites.
Sugi (1987) illustrated the larvae of three Japanese species, and Wang
(1995) that of the type species. They are finely rugose, shaded brown to
blackish brown, with a diffuse pattern of longitudinal lines and sinuous bands.
The thorax has a dorsal tubercle and the anal process is very long, apically
upcurved.
Host-plants recorded (above references; Yunus & Ho, 1980; Zhang,
1994) are Viburnum (Caprifoliaceae), Coffea, Mussaenda, Pavetta,
Randia, Uncaria and Wendlandia (Rubiaceae).
The genus is most diverse in the Oriental Region but extends into the
eastern Palaearctic, with one species in N. America. Representation in the
Australasian tropics is weaker, extending as far east as the Solomons. Watson
(1967) recognised six species-groups, only two of which (insignis and carnea
Butler groups) extend into the Australasian tropics. There are eight species in
Borneo, the first belonging to the extensa Walker group, the next four to
the insignis group, carnea to the carnea group and the rest
to the rubromarginata Swinhoe group.
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