Philobota stella (Newman, 1856)
 (one synonym: Philobota crepera Meyrick, 1884)
PHILOBOTA GROUP
OECOPHORINAE,   OECOPHORIDAE,   GELECHIOIDEA
 
Don Herbison-Evans,
(donherbisonevans@yahoo.com)
and
Stella Crossley

Philobota stella
(Photo: courtesy of Donald Hobern, Aranda, Australian Capital Territory)

The adult moth of this species has white and dark brown speckled forewings which each have a white-edged black costa and several black spots. The labial palps are dark brown. The wingspan is about 2.5 cms.

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

The species has been found in:

  • New South Wales,
  • Australian Capital Territory,
  • Victoria, and
  • Tasmania.

    Philobota stella
    drawing by Edward Newman and G.H. Ford, listed as Anesychia stella    ,
    Characters of a few Australian Lepidoptera, Collected by Mr. Thomas R. Oxley,
    Transactions of the Entomological Society of London,
    New Series, Volume 3 (1856), Plate XVIII, fig. 5,
    image courtesy of Biodiversity Heritage Library, digitized by Smithsonian Libraries.

    Further Reading:

    Ian F.B. Common,
    Oecophorine Genera of Australia II: The Chezala, Philobota and Eulechria groups (Lepidoptera: Oecophoridae),
    Monographs on Australian Lepidoptera Volume 5,
    CSIRO Publishing, 1997, pp. 272, 278.

    Edward Meyrick,
    Descriptions of Australian Micro-Lepidoptera,
    Proceedings of the Linnean Society of New South Wales,
    Volume VIII (1883), p. 484.

    Edward Newman,
    Characters of a few Australian Lepidoptera, Collected by Mr. Thomas R. Oxley,
    Transactions of the Entomological Society of London,
    Series 2, Number 3 (1856), pp. 290-291, and also Plate 18, Fig. 5.

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    (updated 1 November 2012, 2 March 2023)