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Home » Guide » Arthropods (Arthropoda) » Hexapods (Hexapoda) » Insects (Insecta) » Butterflies and Moths (Lepidoptera) » Owlet Moths and kin (Noctuoidea) » Erebidae » Tiger and Lichen Moths (Arctiinae) » Tiger Moths (Arctiini) » Spilosomina » Hypercompe

Genus Hypercompe

Classification · Synonyms and other taxonomic changes · Numbers · Identification · Range · Food · Print References · Internet References · Works Cited

Black Wooly Caterpillar - Hypercompe scribonia

Giant Leopard Moth - Hypercompe scribonia

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 Noctuoidea (Owlet Moths and kin)

Family Erebidae

Subfamily Arctiinae (Tiger and Lichen Moths)

Tribe Arctiini (Tiger Moths)

Subtribe Spilosomina

Genus Hypercompe

Synonyms and other taxonomic changes

Hypercompe Hübner, 1819

Ecpantheria - treated as a junior synonym of Hypercompe by Watson (1977) and Watson and Goodger (1986)

Numbers

7 species in North America (1)

more than 80 species in Central and South America (Markku Savela, FUNET)

Identification

Adult: thorax and wings white with solid or hollow black spots; body thick and stout; abdomen variously coloured black or blue with orange or yellow markings

Larva: body thick, stout, covered with long black hairs; body surface orange or reddish but usually obscured by hair; curls into a ball when disturbed

Similar in appearance to Zeuzera.(2)

Range

southern Canada to southern South America

Food

larvae feed on leaves of a great variety of broad-leaved plants

Print References

Watson, Allan. 1977. A review of the suffusa species-group of Hypercompe Hübner, with a description of a new species affecting Gossypium hirsutum L. (Cotton). Revista de la Facultad de Agronomia 9(2): 137-147.

Watson and Goodger. 1986. Catalogue of the Neotropical Tigermoths. Occasional papers on systematic entomology. 1: 1-71.

Internet References

pinned adult images of male and female H. scribonia, plus live larva images (James Adams, Dalton State College, Georgia)

list of world species plus synonyms and references (Markku Savela, FUNET)

copy of Watson's 1977 publication cited in Print References section above (Revista de la Facultad de Agronomia, Venezuela)

classification - Ecpantheria treated as a junior synonym of Hypercompe (Brian Pitkin, Butterflies and Moths of the World)

Works Cited

1.	Nearctica: Nomina Insecta Nearctica

2.	Hidden Company that Trees Keep: Life from Treetops to Root Tips James B. Nardi. 2023. Princeton University Press.

Contributed by Troy Bartlett on 16 February, 2004 - 12:32pm
Additional contributions by cotinis, Robin McLeod, Marci Hess
Last updated 24 September, 2023 - 10:31am

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