Species Eudesmia menea - Hodges#8097

8097

Eudesmia menea (Drury, 1782)

Phalaena menea Drury, 1782

Phylogenetic sequence # 930175

Southern Texas, Florida; Mexico to Columbia. [But see Remarks, below.]

The basis for inclusion of Eudesmia menea in the North American fauna is tenuous. For a time in the first half of the 20th Century Eudesmia arida was synonymized (wrongly) under E. menea, thus the many records in AZ and TX were for a time listed under the latter name. However, in the Hodges 1983 Checklist, Franclemont listed E. arida separately as a member of the fauna (#8096), presumably refering to the AZ and TX records. Franclemont also listed "8097 Eudesmia laetifera (Walker, 1865), rev. stat., n. record" along with E. latifasciatus (Butler, 1875) as a synonym. Laetifera had previously been listed (under other genera) as a synonym or aberration of E. menea, occurring in Mexico and Central America. The same was true for latifasciatus (Draudt 1918, Strand 1922).

At present, I can find no valid records of true Eudesmia menea in the U.S. (e.g. AZ, TX, or FL) on BugGuide, iNaturalist, MPG, BOLD, SCAN, or GBIF. The barcoded records of "E. menea" in the U.S. on BOLD are readily identifiable as E. arida. I'm trying to track down the basis for including Florida in the range of E. menea.--CWS

Drury, 1782. Illustrations of Exotic Entomology. Insects 3: 4, pl. 3, fig. 2.

Moth Photographers Group (1)

Barcode of Life Data Systems (BOLD) (2)

Butterflies and Moths of North America (BAMONA) (3)