Heteropsyche poecilochroma Perkins, 1905
(one synonym: Epipyrops doddi Rothschild, 1906)
EPIPYROPIDAE,   ZYGAENOIDEA
 
Don Herbison-Evans,
(donherbisonevans@yahoo.com)
and
Stella Crossley

Heteropsyche poecilochroma
(Photo: courtesy of Ian McMillan, Imbil, Queensland)

This moth was originally bred from carnivorous caterpillars, parasitic on several species of

  • Lantern Flies (FULGORIDAE).

    The early instars of the caterpillar are orange and red, but later become white, and coated with a waxy covering. When mature, the caterpillars leave their host, and form a white cocoon on a nearby blade of grass or some such. The cocoon resembles the waxy coating of a Fulgorid insect.

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

    The adult moth has dark brown wings which look speckled because the wing scales detach very easily with handling. The forewings are twice the span of the hindwings. The wingspan is about 1 cm.

    The species occurs in

  • Western Australia.
  • Northern Territory, and
  • Queensland.


    Further reading :

    Robert Cyril Layton Perkins,
    Leaf-hoppers and their natural enemies (Pt. II. Epipyropidae) Lepidoptera,
    Bulletin of the Hawaiian Sugar Planters' Association Experimental Station,
    Entomological Series 1 (1905) p. 82, No. 1.

    Lionel Walter Rothschild,
    On a new parasitic Tineid moth from Queensland discovered by F.P. Dodd,
    Novitates Zoologicae,
    Volume 13 (1906), pp. 162-169.


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    (written 11 April 2019, updated 7 June 2020, 12 May 2021)