''Polydesma'' is a

genus Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus com ...

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 ...

s in the family

Erebidae The Erebidae are a family of moths in the superfamily Noctuoidea. The family is among the largest families of moths by species count and contains a wide variety of well-known macromoth groups. The family includes the underwings ('' Catocala'') ...

erected by

Jean Baptiste Boisduval Jean Baptiste Alphonse Déchauffour de Boisduval (24 June 1799 – 30 December 1879) was a French lepidopterist, botanist, and physician. He was one of the most celebrated lepidopterists of France, and was the co-founder of the Société entomol ...

in 1833.

Description

Palpi upturned, where the second joint reaching vertex of head. Thorax smoothly scaled. Abdomen with slight basal ridges and tuft of hair. Tibia spineless and more or less hairy. Forewings with somewhat rounded apex. Hindwings with vein 5 arise from above angle of cell. Larva with four pairs of abdominal prolegs, where the first two pairs are rudimentary.

Species

*'' Polydesma boarmoides'' Guenée, 1852 Uganda, South Africa, Indo-Australian Region, Fiji, New Caledonia, Hawaii *'' Polydesma collusoria'' (Berio, 1954) Sierra Leone, Ivory Coast, Nigeria, Cameroon, Zaire, Uganda, Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania *'' Polydesma erubescens'' Walker, 1865 Sri Lanka *'' Polydesma hildebrandti'' Viette, 1967 Madagascar *'' Polydesma scriptilis'' Guenée, 1852 Eritrea, Somalia, Namibia, Bangladesh, East Indies *'' Polydesma umbricola'' Boisduval, 1833 Mauritania, Sierra Leone, the Gambia, Burkina Faso, Ivory Coast, Nigeria, Niger, Cameroon, Congo, Zaire, Angola, Arabia, Egypt, Sudan, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Somalia, Kenya, Malawi, Tanzania, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Eswatini, South Africa, Comoros, Madagascar, Mauritius, India, Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Vietnam, New Caledonia, Australia, Hawaii

References

Pandesmini Moth genera {{Erebinae-stub