Gonitis involuta Walker comb. rev.

Gonitis involuta Walker, [1858] 1857, List Specimens lepid. Insects Colln Br. Mus., 13: 1003.

Gonitis basalis Walker, [1858] 1857, List Specimens lepid. Insects Colln Br. Mus., 13: 1004.

Tiridata colligata Walker, 1857, List Specimens lepid. Insects Colln Br. Mus., 33: 870.

Gonitis vitiensis Butler, 1886, Trans. ent. Soc. London, 1886: 408.

Gonitis basalis Butler, 1886, Trans. ent. Soc. London, 1886: 408.

Cosmophila dona Swinhoe, 1919, Ann. Mag. nat. Hist. (9), 3: 313.

Anomis brima Swinhoe, 1920, Ann. Mag. nat. Hist. (9), 5: 255.

Diagnosis

The species is very variable but can be distinguished from the next two by its generally smaller size and more diffuse forewing markings. The submarginal shading is more irregular, and the reniform is smaller, more 8-shaped.

Taxonomic note

Holloway (1977) distinguished involutafrom the externally similar Afrotropical and eastern Indian Ocean T. sabulifera Guenée comb. n. on differences of the male genitalia. The two are nevertheless close sister-species, and Holloway (1990) referred a record from Henderson I. to sabulifera. Nielsen et al. (1996) recorded the species in Australia as involutaas did Dugdale (1988) for New Zealand where the species occurs as an occasional migrant.

Geographical range

Indo-Australian tropics to Polynesia as far east as Henderson I.; material from New Guinea, Bismarks, Solomons, Vanuatu, Fiji, Rotuma and New Caledonia is referable to ssp. *vitiensis.

Habitat preference

Only one specimen has been taken in recent surveys, from stunted hill forest at 900m on Bukit Monkobo in Sabah. Elsewhere the species is an agricultural pest and would therefore be expected to occur more frequently in disturbed and cultivated areas in the lowlands.

Biology

The larva has been described (mostly as sabulifera) by Gardner (1941, 1947), Mathur (1942), Sevastopulo (1943) and Bell (MS). The prolegs on A3 are reduced, and the crochets on all prolegs are normal, not appendiculate. The head is dark yellow and the body is green, suffused and lined fuscous blackish dorsally. There is a prominent white subspiracular line and a thinner supraspiracular one, the latter with pale salmon-pink patches on each segment just above it. The setae arise from black spots that are ringed white. The spiracles are white with black rims.

The eggs are laid singly beneath young leaves. Pupation is in the soil in a thin, loose cocoon that incorporates soil particles.

Host plants listed (Robinson et al., 2001) are: Dalbergia (Leguminosae); Abelmoschus, Gossypium, Thespesia, Urena (Malvaceae); Eriolaena (Sterculiaceae); Corchorus, Grewia (Tiliaceae). Miyata (1983) noted Rubus (Rosaceae).

Genitalia: