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Members of this new tribe, based on the genus Thinopteryx Butler,
were included in the Ourapterygini (See Ourapterygini) by Warren (1894). The morphological
features of the four included genera (see below) are distinctive and indicate
that the tribe bears little relationship to Ourapteryx Leach.
The male antennae are strongly ciliate, rather than smoothly filiform.
The wing area is large relative to the build of the body, the abdomen and legs
being elongate, slender. The retinaculum in the male is distinctively long,
slender, bar- shaped. In the type genus and Xeropteryx Guenée the
hindwing is produced into a short tail at vein M3, with marginal black spots on
either side as in some Ourapteryx. Both these genera and Pareumelea Warren
have the wings extensively irrorated by fine, transverse striae as in Ourapteryx,
and the fasciation of the forewings in Thinopteryx is also
reminiscent.
However, the male abdomen is distinctive. The basal sternite (1+2) is
relatively very much more elongate than in Ourapteryx, and the setal comb
of sternite 3 is absent. Ourapteryx has socii and a strong gnathus. These
are absent in the Thinopterygini, nor is there a furca. The saccus is well
developed. The setae on the valve are most strongly associated with the costa,
rather than with the apical and ventral lamina. In all genera there is a
prominent spur at the centre of the ventral edge of the valve costa, extending
towards the ventral margin: this feature is particularly diagnostic for the
tribe.
In the female genitalia the ovipositor lobes are short, rounded, the two
pairs of apodemes long and slender. The ductus bursae has a short conical
section at the ostium but is otherwise narrow, unsclerotised. The bursa has a
single, central, or subbasal, large disc-like signum, coplanar with the interior
surface of the bursa, irregularly rugose or spined.
Sugi (1987) illustrated larvae in Thinopteryx and Ourapteryx. Those
of the latter are slender, stick-like, with conical processes on abdominal
segments (See Ourapterygini), whereas in Thinopteryx the larva is shorter,
more robust, smooth, the anal clasper and single pair of prolegs in an anal zone
of paler colour, sharply delineated obliquely from the rest of the body.
The tribe ranges from India and Japan to Sulawesi and the S. Moluccas.
In Africa it is represented by Melinoessa Herrich-Schäffer (See
Scardamiini).
The type genus has members of the Vitaceae as larval host-plants.
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