Calesia transvestita Holloway sp. n.

Diagnosis

♂ 20mm. The forewing facies is similar to that of females of species such as fuscicorpus Hampson (India) and gastropachoides Guenée (Java, Bali) where the male has a significant area of dense, raised scales that obscure the white discal spot and other markings. An intermediate condition is seen in hirtisquama Hampson (Timor) where the markings are evident and the raised scaling is restricted to a small subapical patch. It lacks the relatively strong hindwing fasciation seen in the somewhat blacker rufipalpis Walker (Sri Lanka) and phaeosoma Hampson (S. India): in these also the forewing postmedial is less strongly angled and more distant from the discal white spot. The male genitalia, compared to gastropachoides, have the uncus massively broadened and flexed downwards; the valves are relatively narrow, less splayed out, and with a more robust and distally directed saccular process. In hirtisquama the uncus is as in gastropachoides and the valves are more elongate than in the new species; the latter have a small but distinctive lobe at two thirds on the ventral margin.

Holotype ♂

MALAYSIA, SABAH: Brumas, ex light-trap at Paraserianthes falcataria Plantation (Chey, V.K.) 10.xi.1991. In FRC, Sepilok.

Geographical range

Borneo.

Habitat preference

The only specimen is from a softwood (Paraserianthes) plantation at approximately 230m in the lowlands of Sabah, recorded by Chey (1994) as C. gastropachoides.

Genitalia: