Choreutidae, or metalmark moths, are a

family Family (from la, familia) is a group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or affinity (by marriage or other relationship). The purpose of the family is to maintain the well-being of its members and of society. Idea ...

insect Insects (from Latin ') are pancrustacean hexapod invertebrates of the class Insecta. They are the largest group within the arthropod phylum. Insects have a chitinous exoskeleton, a three-part body ( head, thorax and abdomen), three ...

s in the lepidopteran order whose relationships have been long disputed. It was placed previously in the superfamily

Yponomeutoidea Yponomeutoidea is a superfamily of ermine moths and relatives. There are about 1,800 species of Yponomeutoids worldwide, most of them known to come from temperate regions. This superfamily is one of the earliest groups to evolve external feeding ...

in family Glyphipterigidae and in superfamily Sesioidea. It is now considered to represent its own superfamily (Minet, 1986). The relationship of the family to the other lineages in the group "Apoditrysia

need a new assessment, especially with new molecular data.

Distribution

The moths occur worldwide, with 19 genera in three subfamilies defined by the structural characteristics of the immature stages (larvae and pupae), rather than the characters of the adults (Heppner and Duckworth, 1981; Rota, 2005).

Behaviour

These small moths often bear metallic scales

and are mostly day-flying (some also come to lights), with a jerky, pivoting behaviour, and may fluff up their wings at an extreme angle. Some tropical exemplars such as the genus '' Saptha'' are quite spectacular, with bright green metallic band

The members of the genus '' Brenthia'', usually placed in their own subfamily Brenthiinae, have eyespots on the wings and have been shown to

mimic MIMIC, known in capitalized form only, is a former simulation computer language developed 1964 by H. E. Petersen, F. J. Sansom and L. M. Warshawsky of Systems Engineering Group within the Air Force Materiel Command at the Wright-Patterson AFB in ...

jumping spiders (Rota and Wagner, 2006).

Larval hostplants

Most species skeletonize leaves often among silken webbin

The foodplants of many Choreutinae occurring in the

temperate region In geography, the temperate climates of Earth occur in the middle latitudes (23.5° to 66.5° N/S of Equator), which span between the tropics and the polar regions of Earth. These zones generally have wider temperature ranges throughout t ...

and some tropical species are know

being dominated by

Asteraceae The family Asteraceae, alternatively Compositae, consists of over 32,000 known species of flowering plants in over 1,900 genera within the order Asterales. Commonly referred to as the aster, daisy, composite, or sunflower family, Compositae w ...

Betulaceae Betulaceae, the birch family, includes six genera of deciduous nut-bearing trees and shrubs, including the birches, alders, hazels, hornbeams, hazel-hornbeam, and hop-hornbeams numbering a total of 167 species. They are mostly natives of the ...

Boraginaceae Boraginaceae, the borage or forget-me-not family, includes about 2,000 species of shrubs, trees and herbs in 146, to 156 genera with a worldwide distribution. The APG IV system from 2016 classifies the Boraginaceae as single family of the or ...

, Dipterocarpaceae, Fabaceae, Labiatae,

Moraceae The Moraceae — often called the mulberry family or fig family — are a family of flowering plants comprising about 38 genera and over 1100 species. Most are widespread in tropical and subtropical regions, less so in temperate climates; however ...

(mainly ''

Ficus ''Ficus'' ( or ) is a genus of about 850 species of woody trees, shrubs, vines, epiphytes and hemiepiphytes in the family Moraceae. Collectively known as fig trees or figs, they are native throughout the tropics with a few species extendi ...

''), Rosaceae, Sapindaceae and

Urticaceae The Urticaceae are a family, the nettle family, of flowering plants. The family name comes from the genus ''Urtica''. The Urticaceae include a number of well-known and useful plants, including nettles in the genus ''Urtica'', ramie (''Boehmeri ...

. The European nettle-tap moth ('' Anthophila fabriciana'' Linnaeus, 1767), illustrated her

is a familiar sight pirouetting around "stinging nettles" ''

Urtica ''Urtica'' is a genus of flowering plants in the family Urticaceae. Many species have stinging hairs and may be called nettles or stinging nettles, although the latter name applies particularly to '' Urtica dioica''. ''Urtica'' species are food ...

'' and nearby flowers while '' Choreutis pariana

skeletonizes apple leaves. The last genus has 85 species worldwide one of which, '' Choreutis tigroides, C. tigroides'', is a pest of "jackfruit" (''

Artocarpus ''Artocarpus'' is a genus of approximately 60 trees and shrubs of Southeast Asian and Pacific origin, belonging to the mulberry family, Moraceae. Most species of ''Artocarpus'' are restricted to Southeast Asia; a few cultivated species are more w ...

'') (Dugdale et al., 1999).

References

*Dugdale, J.S., Kristensen, N.P., Robinson, G.S. and Scoble, M.J. (1999) 998 The smaller microlepidoptera grade superfamilies, Ch.13., pp. 217–232 in Kristensen, N.P. (Ed.). ''Lepidoptera, Moths and Butterflies''. Volume 1: Evolution, Systematics, and Biogeography. Handbuch der Zoologie. Eine Naturgeschichte der Stämme des Tierreiches / Handbook of Zoology. A Natural History of the phyla of the Animal Kingdom. Band / Volume IV Arthropoda: Insecta Teilband / Part 35: 491 pp. Walter de Gruyter, Berlin, New York. *Heppner, J. B. and W. D. Duckworth (1981). Classification of the superfamily Sesioidea (Lepidoptera: Ditrysia). ''Smithsonian Contributions to Zoology'' 314: 1–144. *Minet, J. (1986). Ébauche d'une classification moderne de l'ordre des Lépidoptères. ''Alexanor'' 14(7): 291–313. *Rota, J. (2005) Larval and Pupal Descriptions of the Neotropical Choreutid Genera ''Rhobonda'' Walker and ''Zodia'' Heppner (Lepidoptera: Choreutidae) ''Annals of the Entomological Society of America'', 98: 37–47.
Abstract
*Rota, J. and Wagner, D.L. (2006). Predator Mimicry: Metalmark Moths Mimic Their Jumping Spider Predators. ''PLOS One'', 1(1): e45. Published online 20 December 2006.
Abstract/pdf

Sources

*''Firefly Encyclopedia of Insects and Spiders'', edited by Christopher O'Toole, , 2002

External links

Tree of LifeUK Moths ChoreutidaeLepIndex list of species and genera in family ChoreutidaeUS leaf damage ''Millieria''Choreutinae resting postures
{{Taxonbar, from=Q1129651 Moth families Taxa named by Henry Tibbats Stainton