''Prays ruficeps'' 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

Plutellidae The Plutellidae are a family of moths commonly known as the diamondback moths, named after the diamondback moth (''Plutella xylostella'') of European origin. It was once considered to have three subfamilies: Plutellinae, Praydinae, and Scythrop ...

. It is found in Northern and

Central Europe Central Europe is an area of Europe between Western Europe and Eastern Europe, based on a common historical, social and cultural identity. The Thirty Years' War (1618–1648) between Catholicism and Protestantism significantly shaped the a ...

. The

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 o ...

is 14–17 mm. The larvae feed on ash (''

Fraxinus excelsior ''Fraxinus excelsior'', known as the ash, or European ash or common ash to distinguish it from other types of ash, is a flowering plant species in the olive family Oleaceae. It is native throughout mainland Europe east to the Caucasus and Albor ...

'').

References

*Aaarvik, L. et al. ,2017 Nordic-Baltic Checklist of Lepidoptera. ''Norwegian Journal of Entomology'' - Supplement No. 3: 1–236. *Heinemann, 1854): Zehn neue Microlepidoptern. ''Zeitschrift für Entomologie im Auftrage des Vereins für schlesische Insektenkunde zu Breslau'' 8: 1–7. Breslau (J. Urban Kern). *Huemer, P., 2013 Die Schmetterlinge Österreichs (Lepidoptera). Systematische und faunistische Checkliste. ''Studiohefte'' 12: 1–304.

External links

Swedish Moths
Plutellidae Moths of Europe Moths described in 1854 Taxa named by Hermann von Heinemann {{Lepidoptera-stub