| | Insects of Britain and Ireland: the genera of Lepidoptera-Noctuidae |
Aventia Duponchel
Adults. Head smooth. Head with a frontal tuft. Eyes glabrous; not ciliated. Antennae of males ciliate. Labial palps medium; porrect.
Wingspan 28–36 mm. Forewings olive grey; pale grey, or grey, or olive brown, or olive green; patterned transversely; the patterning well marked (with three dark-edged light lines); reniform defined (as a pair of obliquely placed dark dots); orbicular undefined; claviform undefined. Hindwings whitish and ochreous, or whitish-fuscous and fuscous (sprinkled black); conspicuously patterned; without a clear discal mark; transversely lined; exhibiting vein 5. Vein 5 of the hindwings strong; arising nearer to vein 4 than to vein 6; parallel with vein 4. Thorax not crested. Middle tibiae without spines (?). Posterior tibiae with spines; with appressed scales (or loose-haired). Abdomen not crested.
Living adults found June and July.
Larvae, pupae. Larvae feeding on the lichens and algae growing on various shrubs and trees (including conifers); pupating on vegetative parts of the foodplant, or in or under bark or rotten wood (?).
British representation. 1 species; South-east England, Central-southern England, South-west England, English Midlands, Northern England, and Wales; flexula (Beautiful Hook-tip).
Rivulinae.
Illustrations. • L. flexula (Beautiful Hook-tip), with other Ophiderinae and Hypeninae: Kirby 44. OPHIDERINAE. 1, Laspeyria flexula (Beautiful Hook-tip); 2, Parascotia fuliginaria (Waved Black); 5, Colobochyla salicalis (Lesser Belle). HYPENINAE. 3, Herminia grisealis (Small Fan-foot); 4, Herminia tarsicrinalis (Fan-foot); 6, Polypogon tentacularia; 7, Pechipogo strigilata (Common Fan-foot); 8, Hypena crassalis (Beautiful Snout); 9, Hypena proboscidalis (Snout); 10, Hypena obesalis (Paignton Snout). From Kirby 44. • L. flexula, with Macrochilo cribrumalis and Herminia grisealis: Leech, 1886. NOCTUIDAE-HERMINIINAE. 1, Herminia grisealis Small Fan-foot). 2, Macrochilo cribrumalis (Dotted Fan-foot). NOCTUIDAE-RIVULINAE. 3, Laspeyria flexula (Beautiful Hook-tip). From Leech, 1886. • British Ophiderinae. 1, Tyta luctuosa (The Four-spotted); 2*, Tathorhynchus exsiccata (Levant Blackneck: Amphipyrinae); 3, Lygephila pastinum (Blackneck); 4, Lygephila cracca (Scarce Blackneck); 5, Colobochyla salicalis (Lesser Belle); 6, Rivula sericealis (Straw Dot); 7, Scoliopteryx libatrix (Herald); 8, Phytometra viridaria (Small Purple-barred); 9, Parascotia fuliginaria (Waved Black); 10, Laspeyria flexula (Beautiful Hook-tip). Swain, 1961.
We advise against extracting comparative information from the descriptions. This is much more easily achieved using the DELTA data files or the interactive key, which allows access to the character list, illustrations, full and partial descriptions, diagnostic descriptions, differences and similarities between taxa, lists of taxa exhibiting or lacking specified attributes, and distributions of character states within any set of taxa. See also Guidelines for using data taken from Web publications.
Cite this publication as: ‘Watson, L., and Dallwitz, M.J. 2003 onwards. Insects of Britain and Ireland: the genera of Lepidoptera-Noctuidae. Version: 14th February 2021. delta-intkey.com’.
