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Pangrapta Hübner
Type
species: decoralis Hübner,
U.S.A.
Synonyms: Marmorinia
Guenée
(type species epionoides Guenée,
U.S.A. = decoralis);
Saraca
Walker
(type species disruptalis Walker,
China = curtalis Walker);
Stenozethes
Hampson
(type species obscurata Butler,
Japan).
This is
currently a large genus found in both the New World and the Old, but showing a
diversity of morphology that calls for a general revision. Sugi & Kononenko
(1996) have treated species groups in far eastern Asia. It is difficult to
identify many features on which it can be defined, though some of facies and the
genitalia offer promise.
The
wings are generally dark brown with fine, darker fasciae and often tinges of
violet or green. The wing margins are often slightly angled centrally. A few
species have a darker triangle or trapezium on the forewing costa between the
postmedial and submarginal. The distal margins of the wings may be angled
centrally or more rounded. The male antennae are fasciculate or ciliate. The
labial palps are long, slender, particularly the third segment, and upcurved.
The male
abdomen has the eighth segment of the framed corematous type, though this is
variable in development. In the genitalia, the uncus is generally slender,
rather sinuous, including the tapering apex. The valves tend to be long, narrow,
unornamented or, more typically, with a spine-like central process distally
(seen in all the generic type species in the synonymy), though in some species
it has a more basal position. The juxta is broad, with some semblance of an
inverted ‘V’ within its structure. The aedeagus vesica typically has one or
more large cornuti, often on long diverticula.
In the
female genitalia, potentially generic features are an unusual density and
general distribution of setae on the eighth segment (see also illustrations in
Sugi & Kononenko (1996)), and one or more conspicuous areas of
sclerotisation, sometimes scobinate, within the basal part of the corpus bursae.
There may be a small, scobinate signum more distally. The seventh segment may
have a pair of pouches near its anterior margin. The ductus seminalis arises
near the base of the corpus bursae.
In the
species account following, comment will be made on the extent to which the
species show the potentially diagnostic genitalia features. P.
dialitha Hampson
is transferred to Diomea Walker on p. 382.
The
larvae of the two Pangrapta species illustrated in Sugi (1987) are rather
spindle-shaped, with the two anterior pairs of prolegs reduced and the anal ones
directed out posteriorly. Both are smooth, cryptically patterned (one mostly
emerald green, the other a charcoal colour), and share possession of glossy
black bands that run down each side of the head, diverging from proximity on the
crown, a generic feature noted by Sugi.
Miyata
(1983) and Sugi recorded the larvae of Japanese species as feeding on several
host families: Caprifoliaceae (Lonicera,
Viburnum);
Oleaceae (Fraxinus,
Ligustrum);
Rosaceae (Malus,
Prunus,
Pyrus,
Sorbus);
Ulmaceae (Ulmus).
Robinson et
al. (2001)
added Rubiaceae (Breonia,
Hymenodictyon,
Neolamarckia)
and Smilacaceae (Smilax) to this list, though the record for Smilax
in
fact refers to a species of Lophoruza Hampson (Acontiinae) that was transferred to Pangrapta
erroneously
by Poole (1989).
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