Nola pumila Snellen

Nola pumila Snellen, 1875, Tijdschr. Ent., 18: 68.

Nolaspreta Butler, 1880, Proc. zool. Soc. Lond., 1880: 671.

Nolaminuta Hampson, 1891, Illust. typical Specimens lepid. Heterocera Colln Br. Mus., 8: 48.

Diagnosis and taxonomic note

This is a small species with rather uniform brown forewings having an oblique postmedial that is a darker brown shade incorporating a row of black flecks on the veins.

There are also darker patches on the costa antemedially and medially.

The male genitalia have the dorsal arm of the valve broader than the ventral and tapering distally; it appears to have a strong overlap with the ventral arm basally, and there is no harpe evident.

The aedeagus is narrow, with a single large cornutus in the vesica.

The species is very close to insularum Collenette, which appears to replace it in the Pacific.

The larger, paler N. samoana Hampson from the S.W. Pacific also has similar genitalia.

These taxa are also discussed by Robinson (1975) and Holloway (1979). The exact geographical range needs to be established by further dissection.

Poole (1989) listed the species erroneously as pumilla. The identity of the taxon vanhasseltii Heylaerts needs to be investigated in relation to pumila and N. qualida Staudinger.

The original description (*Annls Soc. ent.

Belg.*, 36: 44) indicates a quadrifine hindwing, but the taxon was placed as a synonym of squalida by Hampson (1900), though this was only tentatively accepted by Toulgoët (1979). The type, a male from Java, was not located in RMNH, Leiden, by the author.

Geographical range

Indo-Australian tropics.

Habitat preference

The species is not uncommon from the lowlands to 1200m, perhaps favouring disturbed forest and more open habitats.

During the Mulu survey it was taken particularly in the lower montane zone of the limestone G. Api, where the forest is relatively open.

Biology

The larva has been reared from the fruits of Shorea (Dipterocarpaceae) (Robinson et al., 2001); records of flower-feeding on Dryobalanops in the same family tentatively attributed to N. vanhasseltii Heylaerts by these authors may also refer to pumila.

Genitalia: