''Clerarcha poliochyta'' is a

moth Moths are a group of insects that includes all members of the order Lepidoptera that are not Butterfly, butterflies. They were previously classified as suborder Heterocera, but the group is Paraphyly, paraphyletic with respect to butterflies (s ...

in the family

Xyloryctidae Xyloryctidae is a family of moths contained within the superfamily Gelechioidea described by Edward Meyrick in 1890. Most genera are found in the Indo-Australian region. While many of these moths are tiny, some members of the family grow to a wing ...

. It was described by

Alfred Jefferis Turner Alfred Jefferis Turner (3 October 1861 in Guangzhou, Canton – 29 December 1947 in Brisbane, Queensland, Australia) was a pediatrician and amateur entomologist. He was the son of missionary Frederick Storrs-Turner. He introduced the use of diph ...

in 1902. It is found in

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

, where it has been recorded from the

Northern Territory The Northern Territory (abbreviated as NT; known formally as the Northern Territory of Australia and informally as the Territory) is an states and territories of Australia, Australian internal territory in the central and central-northern regi ...

and

Queensland Queensland ( , commonly abbreviated as Qld) is a States and territories of Australia, state in northeastern Australia, and is the second-largest and third-most populous state in Australia. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Austr ...

. The

wingspan The wingspan (or just span) of a bird or an airplane is the distance from one wingtip to the opposite wingtip. For example, the Boeing 777–200 has a wingspan of , and a wandering albatross (''Diomedea exulans'') caught in 1965 had a wingsp ...

is 20–28 mm. The forewings are pale grey, mixed with white and dark fuscous and with a short narrow vertical dark fuscous line from the fold in the disc at one-third. There is a dark fuscous discal dot surrounded by white at two-thirds and a subterminal series of dark fuscous streaks on the veins, as well as a series of minute terminal dark fuscous dots, obsolete towards the costa. The hindwings are grey. The larvae feed on ''

Melaleuca quinquenervia ''Melaleuca quinquenervia'', commonly known as the broad-leaved paperbark, paper bark tea tree, punk tree or niaouli, is a small- to medium-sized tree of the myrtle Family (biology), family, Myrtaceae. It grows as a spreading tree up to tall, ...

''.Xyloryctine Moths of Australia
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References

Xyloryctidae Moths described in 1902 {{Xyloryctidae-stub