''Stilbia anomala'', the false footman or anomalous, 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 ...

. It is found in parts of western Europe.

Technical description and variation

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 of ...

is 29–36 mm. Forewing grey, shining; the costa suffused with dark fuscous; inner and outer lines double, blackish, filled in with whitish, irregularly dentate; subterminal pale with suffusedly darker edges; orbicular and reniform stigmata with pale annuli externally dark margined, separated by a diffuse dark shade, the former oblique and narrow; hindwing white tinged with brown along termen; in the female the forewing is more uniformly blackish fuscous; — the form ''philopalis'' Grasl. ow species ''Stilbia philopalis'' (Graslin, 1852) from S. E. France, is smaller, paler, with the markings showing up more prominently; - ''andalusica'' Stgr. ow species ''Stilbia andalusiaca'' Staudinger, [1892, a Spanish form, is also smaller than the typical, but with less distinct lines and markings; — in ''syriaca'' Stgr., [now species ''Stilbia syriaca'' Staudinger, 1892] from Asia Minor, the wings are broader, the hindwing as well being much darker; ''calberlae'' Failla-Ted.[now species ''Stilbia calberlae'' (Failla-Tedaldi, 1890)] , from Sicily, is certainly a good aberration: the males are blacker in forewing than the darkest female of the typical form, with the hindwing brightly white.

Biology

Adults are on wing from August to September. Larva green to pale brown; dorsal and subdorsal lines yellowish white, with dark margins;spiracular whitish, with the upper edge grey. The larvae feed on various grasses, including ''

Deschampsia flexuosa ''Deschampsia flexuosa'', commonly known as wavy hair-grass, is a species of bunchgrass in the grass family widely distributed in Eurasia, Africa, South America, and North America. Description Wavy hair-grass, ''Deschampsia flexuosa'', has wiry ...

''.

References

External links

The Anomalous on UKmoths
Taxonomy
Fauna EuropaeaLepiforum.de
Hadeninae Moths of Europe Moths described in 1812 Taxa named by Adrian Hardy Haworth {{Hadeninae-stub