They are brown with two white spots on each segment. They are loopers with only two pairs of prolegs. They grow to a length of about 4 cms.

(Photo: courtesy of S. Williams, Moths of Victoria: Part 4)

The caterpillars pupate in a loose cocoon in the debris on the soil surface.

(Specimen: courtesy of the Macleay Museum, University of Sydney)

The adult moth has brown forewings with a line across them, and a white line along the costa. The hindwings are yellow, sometimes with a brown margin. Each wing often has a dark dot in the middle of it. In its natural posture, the forewings are held like a triangle, and cover the bright hindwings. The lines on each forewing are aligned to look like the midvein of a leaf. The forewings each have a recurved pointed wingtip. The undersides have a dark blotch near the margin of each wing. The wingspan can reach up to 4 cms.

(Photo: courtesy of Ken Harris, Morwell Park, Victoria)

The species may be found in the south-eastern quarter of Australia, including

Further reading :

Pat and Mike Coupar,
Flying Colours,
New South Wales University Press, Sydney 1992, p. 45.

Peter Hendry,
The genus Epidesmia (Lepidoptera: Geometridae),
Butterflies and Other Invertebrates Club,
Metamorphosis Australia,
Issue 102 (December 2021), pp. 34-39.

Gottlieb August Wilhelm Herrich-Schäffer,
Sammlung neuer oder wenig bekannter aussereuropäischer Schmetterlinge,
Series I, Volume 1, Part 7 (1855), p. 64, and also Plate 62, fig. 350.

Peter Marriott,
Moths of Victoria: Part 4,
Emeralds and Allies - GEOMETROIDEA (B),
Entomological Society of Victoria, 2012, pp. 14-15, 18-19.

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(updated 20 June 2013, 16 August 2024)