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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) » Euchromiina » Horama » Texas Wasp Moth - Hodges#8287 (Horama panthalon)

Species Horama panthalon - Texas Wasp Moth - Hodges#8287

Classification · Hodges Number · Synonyms and other taxonomic changes · Numbers · Size · Identification · Range · Habitat · Season · Food · Life Cycle · Remarks · See Also · Print References · Internet References · Works Cited
Horama panthalon Texas Wasp Moth - Horama panthalon moth - Horama panthalon moth - Horama panthalon Unknown Flying insect on asters - Horama panthalon Texas wasp moth Horama panthalon texana - Horama panthalon Texas wasp moth Horama panthalon texana - Horama panthalon Horama panthalon? - Horama panthalon
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 Euchromiina
Genus Horama
Species panthalon (Texas Wasp Moth - Hodges#8287)
Hodges Number
8287
Synonyms and other taxonomic changes
Horama panthalon (Fabricius, 1793)
Mastigocera tibialis Butler, 1876
Horama serena Schaus, 1924
Horama stoneri Lindsey, 1926
Horama tibialis
Callicarus texanus Grote, 1866
Zygaena panthalon Fabricius 1793

The North American subspecies is Horama panthalon texana.
Phylogenetic Sequence # 930465
Numbers
Lafontaine & Schmidt (2010) listed two species of the genus Horama in America north of Mexico. (1)
Size
The wingspan is 32-34 mm.
Identification
Abdomen purplish/brown/black with many orange rings, hind legs black and orange with a large feathering on the tibiae (males (2)*), antennae black with orange tips, thorax and head black with orange and white markings, wings brown.
Some examples lack the orange abdominal bands (3)
Thought to be a Batesian mimic of paper wasps, Polistes species (4).
*Sexual dimorphism in tibial scales not mentioned by Dietz and Duckworth (5), and they say males and females are similar.
Range
c. TX to S. Amer., strays from AZ to FL - Map (MPG)
Habitat
Usually found on flowers, esp. Eupatorium (3)
Season
Moth Photographers Group - large map with some distribution data. (6)
Food
Adults nectar.
Life Cycle
Caterpillar and larval food unrecorded (almost). "Adult has been collected at Wislizenia refracta var. mamillata (Capparidaceae)" (5). That plant is called " jackass-clover or spectacle fruit". One record of caterpillar on Desert Yaupon, Schaefferia cuneifolia, (Celastraceae)--see iNaturalist.
Remarks
Common to abundant in southmost Texas (3).
Verification needed that only males have tufts of hair-like scales on tibiae--all images to date seem to have this feature, and some of these have more plumose antennae than others, indicating both sexes are being seen--Patrick Coin 4 February 2021.

Subspecies: (7)
Horama panthalon panthalon (Panama, north Colombia, north Venezuela and the Antilles)
Horama panthalon texana (Grote, 1868) (south Texas, Arizona, New Mexico, Florida, Mexico and Guatemala)
Horama panthalon viridifusca (Schaus, 1904) (south Brazil, north Argentina, Bolivia and Paraguay)
See Also
Horama plumipes (Drury)
Print References
Covell, p. 77 plate 11-17 (8)
Eaton and Kaufman, pp. 262-263 (9)
Powell, J.A. & P.A. Opler, 2009. Moths of Western North America. p. 274, pl. 49.8.(10)
Internet References
Moth Photographers Group (6)
Barcode of Life Data Systems (BOLD) (11)
North American Butterfly Association - South Texas
Butterflies and Moths of North America (BAMONA) (4)
Works Cited
1.Annotated check list of the Noctuoidea (Insecta, Lepidoptera) of North America north of Mexico.
Donald J. Lafontaine, B. Christian Schmidt. 2010. ZooKeys 40: 1–239 .
2.Peterson Field Guides: Eastern Moths
Charles V. Covell. 1984. Houghton Mifflin Company.
3.Illustrated Checklist of the Lepidoptera of the Lower Rio Grande Valley, Texas, Vol. 2B: Macro-Moths
Ed Knudson & Charles Bordelon. 2004. Texas Lepidoptera Survey, Houston. xiv + 59 pp. 20 plates.
4.Butterflies of North America
5.A review of the genus Horama (Hübner) and reestablishment of the genus Poliopastea (Hampson) (Lepidoptera: Ctenuchidae)
Robert E. Dietz IV, W. Donald Duckworth. 1976. Smithsonian Contributions to Zoology, 215: 1-25.
6.North American Moth Photographers Group
7.Wikipedia
8.Field Guide to Moths of Eastern North America
Charles V. Covell, Jr. 2005.
9.Kaufman Field Guide to Insects of North America
Eric Eaton, Kenn Kaufman. 2006. Houghton Mifflin.
10.Moths of Western North America
Powell and Opler. 2009. UC Press.
11.BOLD: The Barcode of Life Data Systems
Contributed by tom murray on 9 December, 2005 - 8:48pm
Additional contributions by cotinis, anitagould, Mike Quinn, Maury Heiman, Robert H. Biagi
Last updated 20 June, 2023 - 4:56pm

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