''Pheosia gnoma'', the lesser swallow prominent, 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 ...

from the family

Notodontidae Notodontidae is a family of moths with approximately 3,800 known species. The family was described by James Francis Stephens in 1829. Moths of this family are found in all parts of the world, but they are most concentrated in tropical areas, espe ...

. The species was first described by

Johan Christian Fabricius Johan Christian Fabricius (7 January 1745 – 3 March 1808) was a Danish zoologist, specialising in "Insecta", which at that time included all arthropods: insects, arachnids, crustaceans and others. He was a student of Carl Linnaeus, and is cons ...

in 1777. The moth can be found across the

Palearctic realm The Palearctic or Palaearctic is the largest of the eight biogeographic realms of the Earth. It stretches across all of Eurasia north of the foothills of the Himalayas, and North Africa. The realm consists of several bioregions: the Euro-Sibe ...

(northern and central Europe, Russia, eastern Siberia, Russian Far East, Amur). It has a forewing length of 20–26 mm.

Description

The

imago In biology, the imago (Latin for "image") is the last stage an insect attains during its metamorphosis, its process of growth and development; it is also called the imaginal stage, the stage in which the insect attains maturity. It follows the f ...

can be easily confused with '' Pheosia tremula'' but ''P. gnoma'' is usually smaller, and the ground colour has usually less brown in it. The chief character by which it may be distinguished is the broader and clearer white wedge-shaped mark between veins 1 and 2 on the forewings of ''P. gnoma''. File:Moths of the British Isles Plate028.jpg , Plate showing the differences between ''P. gnoma'' and ''P. tremula'' File:BirkenwaldFinnland 2.jpg , Habitat in Finland The host plant of the lesser swallow prominent is the

birch A birch is a thin-leaved deciduous hardwood tree of the genus ''Betula'' (), in the family Betulaceae, which also includes alders, hazels, and hornbeams. It is closely related to the beech-oak family Fagaceae. The genus ''Betula'' contains 30 ...

(''Betula'') (British Isles), '' Betula pendula'' (Finland) ''

Betula pubescens ''Betula pubescens'' (syn. ''Betula alba''), commonly known as downy birch and also as moor birch, white birch, European white birch or hairy birch, is a species of deciduous tree, native and abundant throughout northern Europe and northern Asia ...

'' (Finland). The moth survives winter as a

pupa A pupa ( la, pupa, "doll"; plural: ''pupae'') is the life stage of some insects undergoing transformation between immature and mature stages. Insects that go through a pupal stage are holometabolous: they go through four distinct stages in their ...

underground.

References

External links

*
''Fauna Europaea''
* Taxonomy
''Lepiforum e.V.''''De Vlinderstichting''
{{Taxonbar , from=Q865512 Notodontidae Moths of Europe Taxa named by Johan Christian Fabricius

Description

References

Further reading

External links