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Cyclidia Guenée
Type species: substigmaria Hübner, China.
The genus has the features listed in the account of its subfamily.
Species are much larger than those of the other included genus, Mimozethes Warren
(China, Japan), that has the forewing only slightly or not falcate. The pattern
is usually grey on white, variations on the theme of the two Bornean species, or
mauve irroration on dark blackish brown as in C. orciferaria Walker
(China, Peninsular Malaysia and Sumatra), illustrated by Barlow (1982), rather
than bipunctate as in Drepaninae.
The male abdomen has almost corematous scent pencils associated with
sclerotised bands arising laterally at the posterior of the second tergite, just
posterior to the tympanal organs. These are much weaker in Mimozethes. The
genitalia have the valve simple, without the saccular process or harp seen in Mimozethes.
The uncus is closely flanked by a pair of socii, absent in Mimozethes. The
gnathus is strong in both genera.
In the female both genera have the ovipositor lobes rather short,
rounded. In Cyclidia the ductus is longer, more slender, the bursa ovate
with a longitudinal band of sclerotisation basally within it, with arrays of
short spines lining its flanks, points outwards, on either side of an unspined
or weakly scobinate central zone. This is not present in Mimozethes, but
may be homologous with the thyatirine signum. Some species, e.g. C. javana
Aurivillius, have a smaller, rounded, rugose signum adjacent to this band.
The eggs and larvae of the type species in Japan are illustrated in Sugi
(1987). The spherical eggs are laid in a loose group, and the larvae remain
together in early instars, pale brownish grey with black heads. The mature larva
is dark brown to just above the legs, thence ventrally it is pale greyish white.
Within the dark brown there is a broad dorsolateral yellow and white band,
broken by dark brown bars into three square to rectangular sections on each
segment.
Both Japanese cyclidiines (the other being Mimozethes argentilinea Leech)
feed as larvae on Alangium in the Alangiaceae, a monobasic family of Old
World tropical and subtropical trees.
The genus is restricted to the Oriental tropics and subtropics and does
not extend east of Sundaland. There are two species in Borneo.
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