Image of Lophoptera purpuribasis Holloway ♀ — ♀

Lophoptera purpuribasis Holloway sp. n.

Diagnosis

♂♀ 12-13mm.

The species is larger than pallibasis (10-12mm), its closest relative.

The forewing markings differ only slightly, having the curved fascia enclosing the basal zone set slightly closer to the reniform and more emphatic than in pallibasis; the basal zone is tinged slightly with purple rather than pale brown, and the whole is a darker, less rich brown; the zone between the medial and postmedial is somewhat paler than in pallibasis. The species also resembles L. brunnistis, described later, but the forewing is more purple-brown, the postmedial more curved, and the paler subbasal and medial zones are also distinctive.

In the male genitalia the valves and uncus are more robust but otherwise similar in form to those of pallibasis; the apical portion of the valve is longer, more slender, pyriform instead of roundish.

In the female genitalia the apophyses of the 8th segment are small, tapering, rather than broadening out asymmetrically apically; the ovipositor lobes are rounded rather than triangular.

There is a finely setose lobe ventral to the post-ostial invagination at the base of the ductus bursae, and the invagination itself was shorter, broader in one paratype than in the other.

Holotype ♂

BRUNEI: 60m, Ulu Belait, lowland forest, 23 Jan 1979 (Lt. Col. M.G. Allen), BM noctuid slide 11409.

Paratype

1 ♀ Bidi, SARAWAK, 1907-1908 (C.J. Brooks), BM noctuid slide 11408; 1 ♀ site 13, 1 ♂, 1 ♀ (slide 11415) site 16, 1 ♂ site 17 (slide 11418) SARAWAK, Gunong Mulu Nat. Park, R.G.S. Exped 1977-8 (J.D. Hollowayet al.).