''Euxoa obelisca'', the square-spot dart, 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 ...

of the family

Noctuidae The Noctuidae, commonly known as owlet moths, cutworms or armyworms, are a family (biology), family of moths. Taxonomically, they are considered the most controversial family in the superfamily Noctuoidea because many of the clades are constantly ...

. It is found in the

Palearctic realm The Palearctic or Palaearctic is a biogeographic realm of the Earth, the largest of eight. Confined almost entirely to the Eastern Hemisphere, it stretches across Europe and Asia, north of the foothills of the Himalayas, and North Africa. The ...

(Europe,

Central Asia Central Asia is a region of Asia consisting of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan. The countries as a group are also colloquially referred to as the "-stans" as all have names ending with the Persian language, Pers ...

North Africa North Africa (sometimes Northern Africa) is a region encompassing the northern portion of the African continent. There is no singularly accepted scope for the region. However, it is sometimes defined as stretching from the Atlantic shores of t ...

Asia minor Anatolia (), also known as Asia Minor, is a peninsula in West Asia that makes up the majority of the land area of Turkey. It is the westernmost protrusion of Asia and is geographically bounded by the Mediterranean Sea to the south, the Aegean ...

Technical description and variation

Forewing purplish brown; costa pale to outer line: cell dark brown; stigmata large, greyish ochreous: the claviform dark; hindwing in male white, with narrow grey shade along margin, in female more or less grey-tinged throughout.- in ab. '' fictilis'' Hbn. the forewing is more variegated, the submarginal line preceded by a row of distinct black teeth; - ab. '' ruris'' Hbn. , larger than typical, reddish grey or reddish brown, with or without the pale costa: stigmata large and pale: - ab. '' villiersii'' Guen. is also larger than typical; forewing ochreous grey with costa and both stigmata whitish, darker in the female; — ab. ''plectoides'' Guen. the same size as type, forewing with more acute apex, deep shining violet brown, with traces of subterminal only: costa and stigmata (which are small) pale testaceous; the orbicular somewhat angulated, the reniform constricted in middle: claviform obsolete: the cell deep black; hindwing very dark; described from a female only from Lapland; omitted by Staudinger, but probably a distinct species: a very distinct form from the Urals, which may be called ab. ''carbonis'' nov.

arren Arren may refer to: * Arren Bar-Even (1980–2020), Israeli biochemist and biologist * Arren, a major character in ''The Farthest Shore'' and ''The Other Wind'', fantasy novels by Ursula K. Le Guin * Arrën Arrën is a village and a former munic ...

has the ground colour purplish black, with the costal streak and upper stigmata pale and the cell deep black: all the lines indistinct: several examples of both sexes sent from Uralsk by M. Bartel. The caterpillar is obscure greyish or brownish, with a dark-edged pale line along the middle of the dorsum, and a dusky line on each side of it; low down on the sides is another dusky line.

Biology

The moth flies from July to October depending on the location. The larvae feed on various herbaceous plants, such as ''

Helianthemum nummularium ''Helianthemum nummularium'' (known as common rock-rose) is a species of rock-rose (Cistaceae), native to most of Europe Europe is a continent located entirely in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Eastern Hemisphere. It is borde ...

'' and ''

Galium ''Galium'' is a large genus of annual and perennial herbaceous plants in the family Rubiaceae, occurring in the temperate zones of both the Northern and Southern Hemispheres. Some species are informally known as bedstraw. Over 600 species of ' ...

'' species.

Similar species

''Euxoa obelisca'' is difficult to certainly distinguish from its congeners. See Townsend et al.Martin C. Townsend, Jon Clifton and Brian Goodey (2010)
''British and Irish Moths: An Illustrated Guide to Selected Difficult Species''
(covering the use of genitalia characters and other features) Butterfly Conservation. *'' Euxoa tritici'' (Linnaeus, 1761) *'' Euxoa nigricans'' (Linnaeus, 1761) *'' Euxoa cursoria'' (Hufnagel, 1766)

References

External links

Lepiforum
Taxonomy
Fauna Europaeawaarneming.nl Vlindernet Square-spot dart at UKmoths
{{Taxonbar, from=Q1945677 Moths described in 1775 Euxoa Moths of Africa Moths of Asia Moths of Europe Taxa named by Michael Denis Taxa named by Ignaz Schiffermüller