Eublemma perversicolor Holloway sp. n.

♂♂,♀♀ 7-9mm. This species has been included undetected under the general concept of versicolor, and both sexes resemble the more straw-coloured males in species such as angulifera from the Indian Subregion and pallescens from Sulawesi and New Guinea in the versicolor group. However, it is generally much smaller and has a somewhat stronger gradation into darker fringes on the distal margins of the wings, though the latter feature is not obvious in worn specimens. The genitalia of both sexes show significant departures from the general versicolor type. The male has the valve lacking a central angle on the costal margin and having the saccular process longer, tapering and slightly outcurved, set more centrally and partly in a small, oblique pocket anteriorly. The female has the ostium set in a broad pocket. The neck of the corpus bursae is much longer distal to the twist at the base, and the distal expansion is globular rather than pyriform, and contains a pair of unequal spines similar to those in the versicolor subgroup. The male and female genitalia are similar to those of latistriga Warren and quadripunctata Warren (see below).

Holotype ♂

SABAH: 975m, Gunong Monkobo, 116.56E, 5.48N, dipterocarp for., 7-13.vix 1987 (K.R. Tuck), BM noctuid slide 20926.

Paratype ♀#

BRUNEI: 957, 28.4.75, castor (McCrae), BM noctuid slide 20526.

Geographical range

The species probably ranges widely from Taiwan to New Guinea and Queensland, but has only been confirmed by dissection for these localities, Borneo, Bali, Philippines, Sulawesi and the Kei Is.

Habitat preference

Bornean material is from hill dipterocarp forest and lowland agriculture.

Biology

Records for this species have certainly been confused with those for versicolor and related species as discussed earlier, but the paratype above was reared from Ricinus (castor; Euphorbiaceae), and there are definite records of Mangifera (mango: Anacardiaceae) from New Guinea (Miller et al., unpublished; USNM slide 125206).

Genitalia: