Ischyja hemiphaea Hampson

Potamophora hemiphaea Hampson, 1926, Descr. Gen. Spec. Noctuinae, p. 93.

Diagnosis

This and the next species are generally similar in the division of the forewing into dark basal and paler distal halves by an oblique boundary. Only the reniform and orbicular are conspicuously paler in the darker basal half; they are only apparent in the male in hemiphaea, where the reniform is a rounded kidney-shape. The loop on the dorsum tends to be relatively narrow and is darker amid a more ochreous variegation. The marginal zone has an irregular darker zone centrally, and the paler basal zone contains three dentate marks that surround an expansion into it of the purplish longitudinal paler streak that runs through the basal half along vein CuA1.

Taxonomic note

I. copicolor* Prout (S. Moluccas) may merely be a race of hemiphaea.

Geographical range

India, Andamans, Thailand (VK), Singapore, Sumatra, Borneo, Sulawesi.

Habitat preference

The species is more frequent in the lowlands but has been recorded up to 1780m on G. Mulu. Chey (1994) found it to be much commoner than other Ischyja in softwood plantations in the lowlands of Sabah.

Genitalia: