Montane Crest-moth DIPTYCHINI, ENNOMINAE, GEOMETRIDAE, GEOMETROIDEA | (donherbisonevans@yahoo.com) and Cathy Byrne & Stella Crossley |
fifth instar
(Photo: copyright
Cathy Byrne)
When young, these Caterpillars are brown with a pale brown head. Later they become green with some scattered white dots, a red-edged white dorsal line, and brown-edged pale purple head.
The caterpillars feed on the foliage of :
When at rest, the moths of this species fold their wing like a tent, unlike many other Geometrids which lay out their wings flat. The moths have a wingspan of about 5 cms.
Both sexes of adult moth have forewings that are greyish-brown with dark grey squiggles. The veins are brown. The hind wings are a uniform satin grey-brown, darkening toward the wingtips. The bodies of the male are narrower than those of the female. The males have feathery antennae, and the females have thread-like antennae.
The species is found in Australia in the highlands of
The eggs are laid in a distinctive formation, at a slight angle to the substrate, and slightly overlapping each other, like roof shingles. The eggs are initially pale bluish-green mottled with paler green, changing later in colour to transparent on maturity. They appear to hatch after rain.
Further reading :
Marilyn Hewish,
Moths of Victoria: Part 5 - Satin Moths and Allies - GEOMETROIDEA (A),
Entomological Society of Victoria, 2014, pp. 28-29.
Peter B. McQuillan, Catherine J. Young, & Alistair M.M. Richardson,
A revision of the Australian moth genus Paralaea Guest
(Lepidoptera: Geometridae: Ennominae),
Invertebrate Taxonomy,
Volume 15, part 3 (2001), pp. 277-317.
Catherine J. Young,
Characterisation of the Australian Nacophorini and a Phylogeny for the
Geometridae from Molecular and Morphological Data,
Ph.D. thesis, University of Tasmania, 2003.
caterpillar | butterflies | Lepidoptera | moths | caterpillar |
updated 25 July 2020