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For Insects, Spiders & Their Kin
For the United States & Canada

Species Leucania adjuta - Adjutant Wainscot - Hodges#10456

Adjutant Wainscot - Leucania adjuta Moth - PB104974 - Leucania adjuta Mythimna or Leucania  sp. ?  - Leucania adjuta Laeucania  - Leucania adjuta Leucania adjuta? – Adjutant Wainscot Moth? - Leucania adjuta Leucania adjuta Adjutant Wainscot - Hodges#10456 - Leucania adjuta Leucania adjuta - Adjutant Wainscot - Hodges#10456 - Leucania adjuta
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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 Noctuidae (Owlet Moths)
Subfamily Noctuinae (Cutworm or Dart Moths)
Tribe Leucaniini
Genus Leucania
Species adjuta (Adjutant Wainscot - Hodges#10456)
Hodges Number
10456
Synonyms and other taxonomic changes
Leucania adjuta (Grote, 1874)
Heliophila adjuta Grote, 1874
Cirphis adjuta
Phylogenetic sequence # 932960
Size
wingspan about 30 mm, based on photo by Jim Vargo at MPG
Identification
Adult: forewing pale yellowish with light pinkish-brown shading and fine grayish lines along veins; triangular wedge of gray shading along outer margin near apex bordered by pale strip running diagonally from apex to center of wing; medial vein (running from center of wing to base) bordered on inner edge by thick pinkish-brown strip; PM line usually with two distinct dark spots; another dark spot at center of wing, and a fourth spot along inner edge of medial vein; inner margin of wing lacks dark strip [present in some other species]; anterior margin of thorax with thick gray collar tinged with pink; hindwing whitish basally with dark gray veins and diffuse gray shading in outer half
Specimen identified by DNA analysis:

Genitalia:


Larvae: see Godfrey, 1972, p. 97 (2) & Wagner, 2011, p. 506 (3)
Range
eastern United States and southern Ontario
Season
adults fly from May to November in the north; probably all year in Florida
Food
larvae have been reared on Orchard grass (Dactylis glomerata)
Life Cycle
Larva; older larva; pupa; adult:
See Also
L. multilinea and L. lapidaria forewings are grayer, with darker & heavier markings along outer and inner margins, and along inner edge of medial vein
L. linda, linita, phragmitidicola forewings have a PM line composed of several dark dots, their markings are less contrasting/less distinct, and their hindwings are mostly white
Mythimna oxygala forewing has three distinct spots but is otherwise uniformly colored with no contrasting markings
Print References
Grote, A.R. 1874. Notes on American Lepidoptera, with descriptions of twenty-one new species. Bulletin of the Buffalo Society of Natural Sciences. 2: 158
Internet References
pinned adult image [by Paula Kennedy] and live adult images [by Hugh McGuinness] (Dalton State College, Georgia)
presence in Florida; list    (John Heppner, Florida State Collection of Arthropods)