''Spiris striata'', the feathered footman, 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

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'') ...

. The species was first described by

Carl Linnaeus Carl Linnaeus (; 23 May 1707 – 10 January 1778), also known after his ennoblement in 1761 as Carl von Linné Blunt (2004), p. 171. (), was a Swedish botanist, zoologist, taxonomist, and physician who formalised binomial nomenclature, the ...

in his 1758 10th edition of ''Systema Naturae''.

Description

This very distinctive moth 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 . Forewings are usually yellow or light yellow, with narrow longitudinal dark brown stripes in males, while in females the striations may be missing or restricted to the outer parts. Also hindwings are yellow, but they are darker and much wider than forewings and show a dark brown edge. The antennae of the males are pinnate. The caterpillars are hairy and black, with bright spots on the sides and a reddish-brown stripe on the back. The moths are diurnal and they fly May to August depending on the location. The larvae feed on low vegetation and grasses, such as silver grass (''

Corynephorus ''Corynephorus'' is a genus of European, North African, and Middle Eastern plants in the grass family.Festuca ''Festuca'' (fescue) is a genus of flowering plants belonging to the grass family Poaceae (subfamily Pooideae). They are evergreen or herbaceous perennial tufted grasses with a height range of and a cosmopolitan distribution, occurring on ever ...

'' spp.), heather (''

Calluna ''Calluna vulgaris'', common heather, ling, or simply heather, is the sole species in the genus ''Calluna'' in the flowering plant family Ericaceae. It is a low-growing evergreen shrub growing to tall, or rarely to and taller, and is found ...

'' spp.), meadow sage ('' Salvia pratensis''), hawkweed (''

Hieracium ''Hieracium'' (), known by the common name hawkweed and classically as (from ancient Greek ιεράξ, 'hawk'), is a genus of flowering plant in the family Asteraceae, and closely related to dandelion (''Taraxacum''), chicory (''Cichorium''), ...

'' spp.) and mugwort (''

Artemisia Artemisia may refer to: People * Artemisia I of Caria (fl. 480 BC), queen of Halicarnassus under the First Persian Empire, naval commander during the second Persian invasion of Greece * Artemisia II of Caria (died 350 BC), queen of Caria under th ...

'' spp.).

Distribution and habitat

This species can be found in Europe,

Anatolia Anatolia, tr, Anadolu Yarımadası), and the Anatolian plateau, also known as Asia Minor, is a large peninsula in Western Asia and the westernmost protrusion of the Asian continent. It constitutes the major part of modern-day Turkey. The re ...

Kazakhstan Kazakhstan, officially the Republic of Kazakhstan, is a transcontinental country located mainly in Central Asia and partly in Eastern Europe. It borders Russia to the north and west, China to the east, Kyrgyzstan to the southeast, Uzbeki ...

Siberia Siberia ( ; rus, Сибирь, r=Sibir', p=sʲɪˈbʲirʲ, a=Ru-Сибирь.ogg) is an extensive geographical region, constituting all of North Asia, from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east. It has been a part of ...

and

Mongolia Mongolia; Mongolian script: , , ; lit. "Mongol Nation" or "State of Mongolia" () is a landlocked country in East Asia, bordered by Russia to the north and China to the south. It covers an area of , with a population of just 3.3 million, ...

(excluding eastern regions). The feathered footman prefers sunny, sandy, open areas with grass and herbaceous plants, rarely calcareous grasslands.

References

* * Bisby F.A., Roskov Y.R., Orrell T.M., Nicolson D., Paglinawan L.E., Bailly N., Kirk P.M., Bourgoin T., Baillargeon G., Ouvrard D. (red.) (2011
Catalogue of Life

External links

* *

''Moths and Butterflies of Europe and North Africa''.
''Coscinia striata'' on ''Fauna Europaea''''Lepiforum e.V.''
Callimorphina Moths described in 1758 Insects of Turkey Moths of Europe Taxa named by Carl Linnaeus {{Callimorphina-stub