Numbers
Lafontaine & Schmidt (2010) listed 47 species of the genus
Papaipema in America north of Mexico.
(1)Identification
Adult: forewing may be brightly marked, often with yellow or orange dominant, but a number of species are dark brown; white forewing spots or groups of spots variably present or absent among species and among individuals of a species
Range
An exclusively North American genus; distributed throughout United States and southern Canada but species diversity much greater in the east (almost 40 species occur in eastern NA)
Habitat
Open areas: grasslands/prairies, wetlands, sedge meadows, sandy areas, fens, bogs, damp or dry fields/pastures
Season
Moths emerge in late summer/fall.
Food
Caterpillars bore into the roots, rhizomes, and stems of herbaceous plants; rarely seen. A number of species feed only on a particular host plant; a few are generalist feeders.
Life Cycle
Eggs laid in late summer/fall, hatch in spring, and larvae bore into the food plant. Pupate in summer, and moths emerge later the same year.
Remarks
► The moths in this genus are often brightly marked but are usually not commonly seen. Their flight period, late summer/fall, and their supposedly sluggish behaviour is part of the reason for their apparent scarcity. The moths do respond to lights but the lights have to be in the larval habitat for each species. Adults appear not to wander far from the larval hosts plants.
► Many species are rare or locally distributed. Numbers have generally declined since historical times due to loss of wetland and prairie habitat, and the resulting scarcity of particular food plants upon which some species depend (the names of various Papaipema species appear on a number of state lists of "species in greatest need of conservation").
See Also
Hydroeciodes serrata is superficially similar to many
Papaipema species.
Plagiomimicus spumosum is similar to the dark forms of many
Papaipema species.
Print References
Covell
(2) illustrates 12 species.
Smith, J.B., 1899. Contributions toward a monograph of the insects of the Noctuidae of Boreal North America. Revision of the genus
Hydrecia.
Transactions of the American Entomological Society, 26:
12.
Internet References
pinned adult image thumbnails of 24 species in eastern Canada (CBIF)
distribution of 27 species in Canada, listing provinces for each (U. of Alberta, using CBIF data)
