Photo: courtesy of Buck Richardson, from
Tropical Queensland Wildlife from Dusk to Dawn Science and Art

The adult moths have brown wings with a complex pattern of light and dark lines and markings. Underneath, the wings are pale brown, with a broad dark brown submarginal band, and a prominent dark spot in the middle of each wing. The moths have a wingspan of about 7 cms.

female, drawing by Felder & Rogenhofer, listed as Diatenes lawsoni,
Reise der Osterreichischen Fregatte Novara,
Band 2, Abtheilung 2 (5) (1875), Plate CXI, fig. 30,
image courtesy of Biodiversity Heritage Library, digitized by Smithsonian Libraries.

The species is often confused with Speiredonia mutabilis, but the undersides are quite different.

underside
(Photo: courtesy of Ian McMillan, Imbil, Queensland)

The species is normally found over most of the drier inland areas of mainland Australia, including

Further reading :

Ian F.B. Common,
Moths of Australia,
Melbourne University Press, 1990, fig. 46.9, p. 452.

Rudolf Felder & Alois F. Rogenhofer,
Zoologischer Theil: Lepidoptera,
Reise der Osterreichischen Fregatte Novara,
Band 2, Abtheilung 2 (5) (1875), p. 8, and also Plate 111, fig. 30.

Peter Marriott,
Moths of Victoria - Part 8,
Night Moths and Allies - NOCTUOIDEA(B),
Entomological Society of Victoria, 2017, pp. 12-13.

Buck Richardson,
Tropical Queensland Wildlife from Dusk to Dawn Science and Art,
LeapFrogOz, Kuranda, 2015, p. 136.

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(updated 17 March 2011, 5 January 2017, 5 December 2019, 29 November 2020)