Tirathaba parasiticus (T.P. Lucas, 1898) (formerly known as Melissoblaptes parasiticus) GALLERIINAE,   PYRALIDAE,   PYRALOIDEA

Don Herbison-Evans (donherbisonevans@yahoo.com) and Stella Crossley

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

This Caterpillar is carnivorous, and is an internal parasitoid of other caterpillars such as Cryptophasa (XYLORYTIDAE) species.

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

The adult moths have brown forewings each with two faint roundish marks, and with a dark area near the base. The hindwings are pale brown, darkening toward the wingtips. The wingspan is about 3.5 cms.

The species has been found in Australia in

New South Wales.

drawing by George Hampson, listed as Harpagomorpha hepialivora,
Mémoires sur les lépidoptères / rédigés par N.M. Romanoff, Volume 8 (1901), Plate LIII, fig. 19,
image courtesy of Biodiversity Heritage Library, digitized by Ernst Mayr Library, Harvard University.

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Further reading :

Thomas P. Lucas,
Descriptions of Queensland Lepidoptera,
Proceedings of the Royal Society of Queensland,
Volume 13 (1898), p. 85,.

George F. Hampson,
in Émile Louis Ragonot :
Monographie des Galleriinae,
in Nicholas Mikhailovitch Romanoff : Mémoires sur les Lépidoptères,
Volume 8 (1901), p. 441, and also Plate 53, fig. 19.

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(written 1 December 2015, updated 15 November 2025)