Scopariinae, Guenee, 1854

Singh, Navneet, Ranjan, Rahul, Talukdar, Avishek, Joshi, Rahul, Kirti, Jagbir Singh, Chandra, Kailash & Mally, Richard, 2022, A catalogue of Indian Pyraloidea (Lepidoptera), Zootaxa 5197 (1), pp. 1-423 : 41-42

2.10. Scopariinae

Diversity and distribution: found on all continents, including remote oceanic islands, and preferably inhabit humid habitats in tropical mountains and temperate regions ( Nuss 2005b). Globally, they comprise 587 species in 20 genera (Nuss et al. 2003–2022, Léger et al. 2020). In India, 21 species in three genera are reported, representing 3.57% of global diversity of Scopariinae . Of the three genera reported from India, Eudonia Billberg , Micraglossa Warren and Scoparia Haworth , the first two are known by less than 10 species, and the latter is present with 16 species. In India, the Scopariinae are most diverse in the the central Himalaya, followed by the Western Ghats, West- and North West Himalaya and the North East. No Scopariinae are recorded from the Trans-Himalaya, the Deserts, the Semi-Arid and Islands biogeographic zones ( Fig. 29 ).

Adult characters: small to medium-sized moths with a typical slender triangular resting position of their shallowly tented wings. With their cryptic wing maculation of various tones of grey and brown, they are well camouflaged on tree bark, rocks and lichens. The typical “scopariine forewing pattern” of an antemedian line connected with the proximal discoidal and cubital stigma as well as a characteristically X-shaped distal discoidal stigma at the discal cell’s distal end is unique among Pyraloidea . The head features porrect labial palpi and well-developed upturned maxillary palpi. The forewings often bear tufts of raised scales. A synapomorphic character, suggesting the monophyly of Scopariinae , is the female genitalia’s appendix bursae that attaches anteriorly on the corpus bursae. The three Indian genera Eudonia Billberg , Micraglossa Warren and Scoparia Haworth are distinguished from each other on the basis of genitalia morphology: Scoparia features a long, distally pointed uncus, a free distal extension of the valva sacculus, and a phallus with cornuti, in the female genitalia, the signum is absent. Eudonia , on the other hand, has dorsally rounded or bilobed uncus, a sacculus without a free distal extension, no cornuti in the phallus, and a well sclerotised, more or less rounded signum in the female genitalia. In contrast to these two genera, Micraglossa lacks the appendix bursae in the female genitalia ( Nuss 1998, 2005b, Munroe & Solis 1999, Holloway et al. 2001).

Larval characters: very little is known about the larvae of Scopariinae . Hasenfuss (1960) briefly treats some larvae of European Scoparia and Eudonia , and Heckford & Sterling (2005) describe the caterpillar of Scoparia basistrigalis Knaggs.

Food plants: larvae mostly live in silken tunnels lined with droppings at the base of lichens, mosses, lycopods, grasses and dicotyledons. The Hawaiian Eudonia lycopodiae (Swezey) is a stem borer in the lycopod Lycopodium cernuum ( Nuss 2005b) . Moss-feeding habits suggest moss as the ancestral host plant of the Scopariinae ( Léger et al. 2019) .

Figures

FIGURE 29. Species diversity of Indian Scopariinae in different biogeographic zones/zones.