Initially the caterpillars are communal, and skeletonize the undersides of the leaf. Later they separate.

vacated pupa

vacated cocoon
(Photos: courtesy of Damien Moey, Erina, New South Wales)

The caterpillars grow to a length of about 4 cms. When mature, they pupate amongst the ground litter, each in a frass-covered cocoon, with a length of about 3 cms.

(Photo: courtesy of CSIRO/BIO Photography Group, Centre for Biodiversity Genomics, University of Guelph)

The adults have brownish-yellow wings, each with a vague pale spot near the centre, and a circle of six black dots near the base. The hind wings are a deeper yellow, and have two black spots joined by arcs of little black spots. The body is yellow with a black mark on the top of each abdominal segment. The moths have a wing span of about 5 cms.

(Specimen: courtesy of the Macleay Museum, University of Sydney)

The species is found along the eastern coast of Australia, including

The eggs are white, and laid as a pile under a leaf of a food plant.

underside
(Photo: courtesy of Damien Moey, Erina, New South Wales)

Further reading :

Ian F.B. Common,
Moths of Australia,
Melbourne University Press, 1990, pl. 19.26, p. 441.

Gottlieb August Wilhelm Herrich-Schäffer,
Sammlung neuer oder wenig bekannter aussereuropäischer Schmetterlinge,
Verzeichniss der in diesem Werke gelieferten Arten nach Reihenfolge ihrer Veroffentlichung,
Series I, Volume 1, Part 7 (1854), p. 79, No. 119, and also fig 119.

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(updated 29 April 2013, 9 March 2015, 25 December 2019, 7 March 2021)