| | Insects of Britain and Ireland: the genera of Lepidoptera-Noctuidae |
Adults. Head loosely scaled. Head with a frontal tuft. Eyes glabrous; not ciliated. Antennae of males bipectinate (and thickened below the middle). Labial palps long; obliqely ascending.
Wingspan 25–29 mm. Forewings whitish-fuscous or pale brownish; patterned transversely; the patterning fairly well marked (with a clear postmedian dotted line, and a parallel, faint submarginal one); reniform defined to undefined; orbicular defined to undefined; claviform undefined (the stigmata perhaps represented by dots). Hindwings whitish-fuscous, or whitish-fuscous and brownish (terminally brown-tinged); plain; without a clear discal mark; without transverse lines; 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. The males conspicuously fan-footed, via a long, expansible hair-pencil on each anterior tibia. Posterior tibiae with spines; with appressed scales. Abdomen not crested.
Living adults found in July.
Larvae, pupae. Larvae feeding on helophytic Monocots - grasses, sedges and rushes.
British representation. 1 species; South-east England, Central-southern England, South-west England, and English Midlands (local, in marshes); cribrumalis (Dotted Fan-foot).
Herminiinae.
Illustrations. • Hypeninae: Macrochilo cribrumalis (Dotted Fan-foot: B. Ent. 527). • Macrochilo cribrumalis: B. Ent. 527, legend+text. • M. cribrumalis: B. Ent. 527, text cont.. • M. cribrumalis (Dotted Fan-foot), with Herminia grisealis and Laspeyria flexula: 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 Hypeninae (1: Fan-foot Moths). 1(a) and (b),Zanclognatha tarsipennalis (The Fan-foot); 2(a) and (b), Herminia grisealis (Small Fan-foot); 3(a) and (b), Macrochilo cribrumalis (Dotted Fan-foot); 4, Paracolax tristalis (Clay Fan-foot); 5, Trisateles emortualis (Olive Crescent); 6(a) and (b), Pechipogo strigilata (Common Fan-foot). 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’.
