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Pericyma
cruegeri Butler
Homoptera
cruegeri Butler,
1886, Trans.
ent. Soc. London, 1886: 411.
Pericyma
cruegeri Butler;
Holloway, 1976: 31.
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Pericyma
cruegeri |
Pericyma
cruegeri |
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Diagnosis.
The ground colour is usually rich pale brown. The wings are crossed by a
sequence of numerous, darker, fine, wavy, parallel fasciae, with the postmedial,
particularly on the hindwing, more emphatic and consisting of two strong fasciae
on each side of a weaker one. There is some variation, particularly of the
forewing where the medial zone and / or the basal zone can be blackened,
sometimes with the antemedial and postmedial irregularly picked out in white.
One specimen has the medial area completely white.
Geographical
range. Hong Kong, Taiwan, Vietnam, Thailand (VK),
Sumatra, Peninsular Malaysia, Borneo, Philippines, New Guinea, Queensland.
Habitat
preference. Records have been frequent over an altitude range from the
lowlands to 1930m, perhaps more so in montane forests.
Biology.
The larvae were illustrated by Yoshimatsu et al. (1995)
and by Tanahara & Tanahara (2001c). They are elongate, especially over
segments A1 to A4, with the prolegs on A3 lost and those on A4 considerably
reduced. The head and body are bright green, the latter with variable
development of lateral and dorsal white lines. Where the lateral line is strong
and unbroken, there are much larger, irregular dashes of black just above it at
the centre of each segment. The ventral surface is also darker in these more
strongly marked forms.
Host
plants noted by Robinson et al. (2001) are mostly Leguminosae (Acacia,
Caesalpinia,
Delonix,
Peltophorum)
but also include Nephelium (Kuroko & Lewvanich, 1993). The species is known
widely as a pest of Delonix regia, a frequently planted shade tree. Reddy et
al. (1985) referred to complete defoliation by cruegeri,
the larvae wholly or partially stripping the leaflets from the compound leaves.
Pupation was in cocoons enclosed within the leaflets. Common (1990) also
recorded Delonix
and
Peltophorum
as
hosts in Australasia.
The
adult is known as a fruit piercer in Thailand (Bänziger, 1982; Kuroko &
Lewvanich, 1993).
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