Lappet Moth

Description:

Lasiocampidae; Pinarinae; Streblote; Streblote castanea (Swinhoe, 1892). On Feb 2, 2023, I posted a spotting on Project Noah - https://www.projectnoah.org/spottings/19....... dealing with some larvae which I had never seen before and could not identify from any images online. So, I carried out a number of steps involving a combination of reasoning, elimination and assumption. This brought me to a point where I felt confident in identifying the larvae as Streblote castanea. In order to be able to confirm that my identification was right (or to correct it if wrong), I collected four of the larvae and placed them in a home-made captive rearing cage. I fed them and kept the cage clean until they all pupated during the night of Feb 14-15, 2023. Then all I had to do was wait and keep an eye on them. I could not find any information on the duration of their pupation. So, II checked on them once a day for 10 days and then hourly (during daylight hours) until today at 1:00 p.m. when I noticed that one of them had eclosed. I brought the cage out to the backyard and placed it on the ground under the Moringa oleifera Tree (the original habitat) and opened the lid. Pic #1. Shows the newly eclosed moth on the open lid of the cage. It flew off, at amazing speed, just seconds later. The photo, luckily shows the pectinate antennae. So, it is clearly a male. I placed this photo first because it is so much more interesting (and eye-catching) than the others. Pic #2 Taken on Feb 15 when I noticed that pupation had taken place. Pic #3. The moth is clinging to one of the wooden spars of the cage, right next to its pupal case. Pic # 4. Spreading its wings for the first time. Pic #5. On the floor of the cage. Its wings oscillating rapidly, as moths always do, before their first flight.

Habitat:

This Lappet Moth, when still a larva, was one of four spotted in our backyard on a Ben Oil Tree (Moringa oleifera) locally called Malungay. Plant identification - http://www.stuartxchange.org/Malunggay.h......

Notes:

This spotting has a twofold purpose. The first, of course, is to show and identify the moth which is the adult stage of one of the four larvae spotted Feb 2, 2023. The second is to confirm that the “provisional identification”, in that earlier spotting, has been shown to be correct, despite the rather amateur way I went about it. There are still 3 more larvae in the cage which have not yet eclosed. I am keenly awaiting the outcome, in the hope that there might be a female. That would round off this spotting very well.