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Agrotis
Ochsenheimer
Type
species: segetum Denis & Schiffermuller.
Synonyms
and subgenera: Georyx Hubner (type species segetum); Noctua Boisduval
(type species exclamationis Linnaeus; praeccc.); Psammophila Stephens
(type species segetum); Brachypteragrotis Viette (type species patricei
Viette, Amsterdam I., in Indian Ocean); Elegarda Walker (type species
dorsicinis Walker = porphyricollis Guenee, Australia); Neosema
Rebel (type species sesamioides Rebel, Sokotra I.); Porosagrotis Smith
(type species muraenula Grote & Robinson = vetusta Walker,
East U.S.A); Scotia Hubner (type species cinerea Denis &
Schiffermuller, Palaearctic); Tetrapyrgia Walker (type species graphiphorides
Walker = porphyricollis Guenee, Australia); Lycophorus Staudinger
(type species villosus Alpheraky, South U.S.S.R., replacement name for Comophorus
Alpheraky (praeocc.)); Powellinia Oberthur (type species lasserrei
Oberthur, Algeria).
This
large cutworm genus is best defined on features of the genitalia. The male valve
is elongate, lenticular to rhomboidal, with a coronal fringe of setae around the
ventral curvature of the apex. There is a single, simple harpe from the sacculus
centrally, with a small accessory lobe just distal to it. The aedeagus vesica
has a basal, coarsely scobinate, longitudinal band of sclerotisation in a basal
swelling, and extends beyond this as a finely scobinate tube of great length.
This length in the vesica is reflected in the female genitalia where the
appendix bursae is usually longer than the bursa itself, sometimes twice as long
or more, and forms a loop within the abdomen (Common, 1958). There is usually
one short signum band in the bursa, sometimes more.
Two
species are known from Borneo as described below. Two further species may prove
to occur there and are therefore illustrated in Plate 1. They are: Agrotis
segetum Denis & Schiffermuller, a well known European and African pest
species (Carter, 1984; CIE, 1987) that extends through the Oriental tropics to
Palawan, Sumatra, Java and Sulawesi but has not yet been noted from Borneo; Agrotis
interjectionis Guenee, from Sumatra, Java and Sulawesi to Vanuatu and
northern Australia. Common (1958) recorded nine species from Australia, five of
them endemic. One of the Bornean species belongs to a small complex allied to
the Palaearctic A. cinerea, extending to Sulawesi the S. Moluccas and New
Guinea. Agrotis luzonensis Wileman & South (Luzon) does not belong to
this group.
The
biology of the type species and A. ipsilon Hufnagel is described by
Carter (1984).
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