Eriopinae

Keegan, Kevin L., Rota, Jadranka, Zahiri, Reza, Zilli, Alberto, Wahlberg, Niklas, Schmidt, B. Christian, Lafontaine, J. Donald, Goldstein, Paul Z. & Wagner, David L., 2021, Toward a Stable Global Noctuidae (Lepidoptera) Taxonomy, Insect Systematics and Diversity (AIFB) 5 (3), pp. 1-24 : 20

Eriopinae

We found the subfamily Eriopinae to be poorly supported as a distinct subfamily, nesting within Noctuinae ( Fig. 5). Eriopinae consists of the large, cosmopolitan, but primarily tropical, genus Callopistria Hübner, [1821] (type species: Noctua juventina Stoll, 1782 ) with a center of distribution in the Indo-Australian tropics. Callopistria clustered with the Neotropical eriopine genus Argyrosticta Hübner, [1821] (recently placed in Eriopinae by Barbut and Lalanne-Cassou, 2019) and the Nearctic/Neotropical noctuine genus Phuphena Walker, 1858 (BS = 78, SH = 95, UF = 97). Eriopinae show some characteristics typical of Noctuinae, like a hairlike SD1 seta on larval A9, but others that are aberrant for Noctuinae such as a pair of flaps at the end of the larval spinneret, which is highly unusual for Noctuidae let alone Noctuinae. Poole (1995) discussed the distinguishing morphological features of Eriopinae , but noted that the group may just represent a highly modified lineage within Noctuinae. Eriopinae has in the past been recognized within Noctuinae, as the tribe Eriopini ( Ronkay et al. 2001) , and the molecular work of Mitchell et al. (2006) placed Eriopinae as putative sister to Bryophilinae , with these two groups clustering within Noctuinae and rendering it paraphyletic. Broadly, the affinities of Eriopinae with Noctuinae were borne out in our molecular results. Goldstein and Zilli (2019) discussed the morphological similarities between Phuphena and Callopistria that called into question Phuphena ’s current taxonomic placement in the noctuine tribe Phosphilini , and suggested that the genus Thraumata Goldstein and Zilli, 2019 belongs in Eriopinae based on morphological, molecular, and life history data. We do not recommend transferring Phuphena or Thraumata to Eriopinae until the forthcoming work of P.Z.G. and A.Z. (unpublished data) is considered.