(one synonym : Catephia pilipes Guenée, 1852) Tropical White Patch CALPINAE, EREBIDAE, NOCTUOIDEA | (donherbisonevans@yahoo.com) and Stella Crossley |
(Photo: courtesy of Dick Whitford, Mt. Molloy, Queensland)
These Caterpillars are brown with a complex pattern of dark lines on the head and along the body.
The caterpillars have a short pair of horns on the back of each abdominal segment, some associated with a reddish pigmentation. The caterpillars appear to have four pairs of prolegs, but the anterior two pairs are reduced and not used, so it progresses in a looper fashion.
The caterpillars have been recorded feeding on
The caterpillars grow to a length of about 5 cms.
Pupation occurs in a cocoon covered in debris and chewed bark on the trunk or a stem of the food plant.
The adult moths have forewings with a complex pattern in variable colours, including yellow, brown, green, and white. The hindwings are white with broad black margins and dark basal areas.
The black margins of the hindwings sometimes contain white patches. The wingspan is about 5 cms.
This species occurs around the old world in the tropics, including:
as well as the subspecies ecclesiastica (Butler, 1874) occurring Australia which has been found in:
Further reading :
Arthur G. Butler,
On a collection of Lepidoptera Heterocera from Australia,
Cistula Entomologica,
Volume 1 (1874), p. 292.
Ian F.B. Common,
Moths of Australia,
Melbourne University Press, 1990, fig. 45.8, p. 451.
Achille Guenée,
Noctuélites,
in Boisduval & Guenée:
Histoire naturelle des insectes; spécies général des lépidoptères,
Volume 9, Part 7 (1852), pp. 44-45, No. 1375.
Peter Marriott,
Moths of Victoria - Part 8,
Night Moths and Allies - NOCTUOIDEA(B),
Entomological Society of Victoria, 2017, pp. 18-19.
caterpillar | butterflies | Lepidoptera | moths | caterpillar |
(updated 20 July 2012, 24 June 2014, 25 May 2020)