''Apamea rubrirena'' is a

moth Moths are a paraphyletic group of insects that includes all members of the order Lepidoptera that are not butterflies, with moths making up the vast majority of the order. There are thought to be approximately 160,000 species of moth, many of w ...

of the family

Noctuidae The Noctuidae, commonly known as owlet moths, cutworms or armyworms, are a family of moths. They are considered the most controversial family in the superfamily Noctuoidea because many of the clades are constantly changing, along with the other f ...

Distribution

This species is present from northern and western Europe, east through

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia, Northern Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the ...

and Asia to

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...

and

Korea Korea ( ko, 한국, or , ) is a peninsular region in East Asia. Since 1945, it has been divided at or near the 38th parallel, with North Korea (Democratic People's Republic of Korea) comprising its northern half and South Korea (Republic o ...

. It is also present on the

Kuril Islands The Kuril Islands or Kurile Islands (; rus, Кури́льские острова́, r=Kuril'skiye ostrova, p=kʊˈrʲilʲskʲɪjə ɐstrɐˈva; Japanese: or ) are a volcanic archipelago currently administered as part of Sakhalin Oblast in the ...

, the

Aleutian Islands The Aleutian Islands (; ; ale, Unangam Tanangin,”Land of the Aleuts", possibly from Chukchi language, Chukchi ''aliat'', "island"), also called the Aleut Islands or Aleutic Islands and known before 1867 as the Catherine Archipelago, are a cha ...

Lepidoptera and their ecology
/ref> and has been reported from

Alaska Alaska ( ; russian: Аляска, Alyaska; ale, Alax̂sxax̂; ; ems, Alas'kaaq; Yup'ik: ''Alaskaq''; tli, Anáaski) is a state located in the Western United States on the northwest extremity of North America. A semi-exclave of the U.S., ...

for the first time in 1989.

Habitat

These moths colonize montane to subalpine coniferous forests, at an elevation up to above sea level.Pieris
/ref> In Europe they especially occur in the Alps and in lower mountains, while in Russia they can be found in the taiga.

Description

''Apamea rubrirena'' has a

wingspan The wingspan (or just span) of a bird or an airplane is the distance from one wingtip to the other wingtip. For example, the Boeing 777–200 has a wingspan of , and a wandering albatross (''Diomedea exulans'') caught in 1965 had a wingspan of ...

of 40–51 mm. These moths are extraordinarily variable in terms of color, wing shape and size. They usually have head and thorax black-brown, with some white hairs and a meta-thopracic rufous crest. The basic color of the forewings vary from pale orange to reddish brown or blackish brown, with reniform rufous patches and transversal indistinct or whitish wavy lines. The hind wings are monochrome, light gray-brown, with the veins clearly protruding. Tarsi are black with whitish rings.

Biology

The caterpillars overwinter and pupate in May or June of the following year. Adults are on wing from fly from mid or late June to August and sometimes September in favourable conditions. There is one generation per year

univoltine Voltinism is a term used in biology to indicate the number of broods or generations of an organism in a year. The term is most often applied to insects, and is particularly in use in sericulture, where silkworm varieties vary in their voltinism. ...

species. The

larva A larva (; plural larvae ) is a distinct juvenile form many animals undergo before metamorphosis into adults. Animals with indirect development such as insects, amphibians, or cnidarians typically have a larval phase of their life cycle. The ...

e feed on a various grasses, including ''

Festuca altissima ''Festuca altissima'', also known as the wood fescue, is a species of flowering plant belonging to the family Poaceae. It was first described in 1789. Its native range is Europe to Siberia Siberia ( ; rus, Сибирь, r=Sibir', p=sʲɪ� ...

'' and ''

Calamagrostis arundinacea ''Calamagrostis arundinacea'' is a species of bunch grass in the family Poaceae, native to Eurasia, China and India. Under its synonym ''Calamagrostis brachytricha'' it has gained the Royal Horticultural Society's Award of Garden Merit. Descript ...

''. Adults are nocturnal and have been found taking nectar from ''

Rubus ''Rubus'' is a large and diverse genus of flowering plants in the rose family, Rosaceae, subfamily Rosoideae, with over 1,350 species. Raspberries, blackberries, and dewberries are common, widely distributed members of the genus. Most of these ...

'', ''

Cirsium oleraceum ''Cirsium oleraceum'', the cabbage thistle or Siberian thistle, is a species of thistle in the genus ''Cirsium ''Cirsium'' is a genus of perennial and biennial flowering plants in the Asteraceae, one of several genera known commonly as thistl ...

'', ''

Silene vulgaris ''Silene vulgaris'', the bladder campion or maidenstears, is a plant species of the genus ''Silene'' of the family ''Caryophyllaceae''. It is native to Europe, where in some parts it is eaten, but is also widespread in North America, where it i ...

'' and ''

Phyteuma ''Phyteuma'' is a genus of flowering plants in the family Campanulaceae, native to Europe and Morocco. The common name is rampion, a name shared with the related plant ''Campanula rapunculus''. Rampion features prominently in some versions of t ...

''.Arno Bergmann: Die Großschmetterlinge Mitteldeutschlands. Band 4/2: Eulen. Verbreitung, Formen und Lebensgemeinschaften. Urania-Verlag, Jena 1954, DNB 450378381

Bibliography

*Boisduval (1833): Description de quatre nouvelles espèces de Noctuélides. — Annales de la Société entomologique de France 2: 373-378, pl. XIV. Paris (Méquignon-Marvis). *Treitschke, F. (1825): Die Schmetterlinge von Europa 5 (2): 1-448. Leipzig (Gerhard Fleischer). *Zille, A., Ronkay, L. & M. Fibiger (2005): Noctuidae europaeae. Volume 8. Apamaeini. — 323 S., Farbtafeln; Sorø (Entomological Press).

References

External links

* * * Paolo Mazzei, Daniel Morel, Raniero Panfil
Moths and Butterflies of Europe and North Africa

Apamea (moth) Moths of Asia Moths of Europe Moths of North America Taxa named by Georg Friedrich Treitschke Moths described in 1825 {{Apamea-stub