Identification, Images, & Information
For Insects, Spiders & Their Kin
For the United States & Canada
Clickable Guide
Moths Butterflies Flies Caterpillars Flies Dragonflies Flies Mantids Cockroaches Bees and Wasps Walkingsticks Earwigs Ants Termites Hoppers and Kin Hoppers and Kin Beetles True Bugs Fleas Grasshoppers and Kin Ticks Spiders Scorpions Centipedes Millipedes

Calendar

TaxonomyBrowse
Info
ImagesLinksBooksData

Species Coleotechnites atrupictella - Hodges#1792

moth - Coleotechnites atrupictella micro moth - Coleotechnites atrupictella Coleotechnites atrupictella? - Coleotechnites atrupictella moth - Coleotechnites atrupictella A Coleotechnites sp. - Coleotechnites atrupictella 1792 - Coleotechnites atrupictella Coleotechnites atrupictella genitalia - Coleotechnites atrupictella - female
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 Gelechioidea (Twirler Moths and kin)
Family Gelechiidae (Twirler Moths)
Subfamily Gelechiinae
Tribe Litini
Genus Coleotechnites
Species atrupictella (Coleotechnites atrupictella - Hodges#1792)
Hodges Number
1792
Synonyms and other taxonomic changes
Coleotechnites atrupictella (Dietz, 1900)
Eucordylea atrupictella Dietz, 1900
Size
larva length to 12 mm
Identification
Adult: forewing whitish with black trapezoidal patch halfway along costa, partially filled with ground color; AM line black, diffuse, angles backward (distally) from costa to inner margin; legs dark with several white bands

Larva: head greenish-brown, unmarked; body reddish with creamy white dorsolateral and lateral stripes, and creamy white lateral markings
Range
Newfoundland to British Columbia and northern United States; type specimen collected in Hazleton, Pennsylvania
Habitat
coniferous and mixed forests
Season
The flight period appears to be April to September.
larvae present in June and July
Food
larvae feed on leaves of conifers: Black Spruce, Engelmann Spruce, Red Spruce, White Spruce, Lodgepole Pine, Ponderosa Pine, Shore Pine, Western Hemlock, Douglas-fir, Subalpine Fir
Life Cycle
overwinters as an egg; one generation per year
See Also
Stripe-backed Moth (Arogalea cristifasciella) forewing lacks trapezoidal patch, and AM line angles forward (basally) from costa to inner margin; adults fly in April and May
other species of Coleotechnites have different forewing patterns (compare images of numerous species by Sang Mi Lee at MPG)
Print References
Dietz, W.G. 1900. Some new species of N. A. Tineina. 1900 Entomological news, and proceedings of the Entomological Section of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia. 11(2): 350