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Home » Guide » Arthropods (Arthropoda) » Hexapods (Hexapoda) » Insects (Insecta) » Butterflies and Moths (Lepidoptera) » Fairy Moths and kin (Adeloidea) » Fairy Moths (Adelidae) » Adelinae » Adela » Adela flammeusella - Hodges#0224 (Adela flammeusella)

Species Adela flammeusella - Hodges#0224

Classification · Hodges Number · Synonyms and other taxonomic changes · Size · Identification · Range · Habitat · Season · Food · See Also · Internet References · Works Cited

Adela flammeusella - Adela flammeusella - male

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Show images of: caterpillars · adults · both

Classification

Kingdom Animalia (Animals)

Phylum Arthropoda (Arthropods)

Subphylum Hexapoda (Hexapods)

Class Insecta (Insects)

Order Lepidoptera (Butterflies and Moths)

Superfamily Adeloidea (Fairy Moths and kin)

Family Adelidae (Fairy Moths)

Subfamily Adelinae

Genus Adela

Species flammeusella (Adela flammeusella - Hodges#0224)

Hodges Number

0224

Synonyms and other taxonomic changes

From Powell(1), hyperlinked text leads to cited reference:

Adela flammeusella Chambers 1876, Canad. Ent., 8:104

Adela flammensella (typesetting error?) Chambers 1878, Bull. U.S. Geol. Survey, 4:127; Walsingham 1890, Insect Life, 2:284 (synonymy)

Adela flamensella (error) Walsingham 1880, Proc. Zool. Soc. Lond. :78, 79

Adela lactimaculella Walsingham 1880, Proc. Zool. Soc. Lond. :80, pl. 11

Adela flammeella Meyrick 1912, Lepid. Cat. 6:10

Size

Forewing length 5 - 6 mm (2).

Identification

Information below summarized from (1)(2).

Adults - both sexes generally dark coppery-bronze, forewings with dark fringe, hindwings metallic purple:

Males typically have 3 to 6 cream-colored spots on fore wing...two equally spaced along leading edge, and one on hind edge...sometimes with 1 more near the apex, and 2 smaller dots on each wing edge near the base. The 3 spot form was illustrated in Fig. 5 of Walsingham. Males also have larger eyes (diameter about 3 times distance between eyes on top of head) and longer antennae ( > 3 times wing length);

Females can have 4 or fewer vague spots, the case of 2 spots is illustrated in Fig. 6 of Walsingham. They also have much smaller eyes and antenna about 1.5 times forewing length.

Individuals can vary, with both sexes often having a reduced number and/or size of wing spots from those described above.

Range

Southern Washington (Columbia River region), southward (though records lacking in Oregon) through foothills and interior valleys of cismontane California, below 2000' elevation.(1)

Habitat

Open meadows (2).

Season

Late March to June.

Food

Associated with owl's clover Orthocarpus, some species now in Castilleja (2).

See Also

Adela thorpella is similarly colored, typically less conspicuously spotted, has a paler whitish wing fringe, and is smaller with shorter antennae (about 2.5 times wing length in males, 1.3 in females).

Adela oplerella is smaller & darker, males and females both have small eyes, antenna of males only slightly longer than wing length, antenna of females shorter than wing length. Known only from a few populations in San Francisco Bay area, associated with serpentine grasslands.

Internet References

Reference Plate for female A. flammeusella from "Moths of Western North America" by Powell & Opler(2)

CalPhotos Images for A. flammeusella

List of California collection records (Essig Museum, UC Berkeley)

Works Cited

1.	A Synopsis of Nearctic Adelid Moths, with Descriptions of New Species (Incurvariidae) Jerry A. Powell. 1969. Journal of the Lepidopterists' Society 23(4): 211-240.

2.	Moths of Western North America Powell and Opler. 2009. UC Press.

Contributed by Brad Barnd on 7 July, 2007 - 11:29pm
Additional contributions by Aaron Schusteff, Randy Hardy
Last updated 30 March, 2015 - 9:51pm

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