''Sabatinca pluvialis'' is a species of

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 ...

belonging to the family

Micropterigidae Micropterigoidea is the superfamily of "mandibulate archaic moths", all placed in the single family Micropterigidae, containing currently about twenty living genera. They are considered the most primitive extant lineage of lepidoptera (Kristense ...

. It is

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found only in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also foun ...

New Zealand New Zealand () is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and List of islands of New Zealand, over 600 smaller islands. It is the List of isla ...

and is only known from

Secretary Island Secretary Island () is an island in southwestern New Zealand, lying entirely within Fiordland National Park. Roughly triangular in shape, it lies between Doubtful Sound / Patea in the south and Te Awa-o-Tū / Thompson Sound in the north, with ...

. Adults of this species are on the wing from the middle of December until the middle of January. The larval host species is the

liverwort Liverworts are a group of non-vascular land plants forming the division Marchantiophyta (). They may also be referred to as hepatics. Like mosses and hornworts, they have a gametophyte-dominant life cycle, in which cells of the plant carry ...

'' Pseudomarsupidium piliferum''. This species is as "Data Deficient" under the

New Zealand Threat Classification System The New Zealand Threat Classification System is used by the Department of Conservation to assess conservation priorities of species in New Zealand. The system was developed because the IUCN Red List, a similar conservation status system, had s ...

Taxonomy

This species was first described by George Gibbs in 2014. The male

holotype A holotype (Latin: ''holotypus'') is a single physical example (or illustration) of an organism used when the species (or lower-ranked taxon) was formally described. It is either the single such physical example (or illustration) or one of s ...

specimen was collected by Gibbs at Grono Spur on Secretary Island and is held in the New Zealand Arthropod Collection.

Description

Gibbs described the species as follows: As at 2014 the female of this species is unknown.

Distribution

Secretary Island from Pendulo Reach of Doubtful Sound

This species is endemic to New Zealand and is only known from

Fiordland Fiordland (, "The Pit of Tattooing", and also translated as "the Shadowlands"), is a non-administrative geographical region of New Zealand in the south-western corner of the South Island, comprising the western third of Southland. Most of F ...

. It has the most restrictive range of the known species of ''Sabatinca'' in New Zealand. This species first became known to science when John Grehan collected a specimen in 1982. C. F. Butcher subsequently collected larvae now known to of this species.

Behaviour

As at 2014 adults of this species are known to be on the wing from the middle of December until the middle of January but it has been hypothesised that their flight period is likely to be of a longer duration.

Host species

Larvae of this species have been collected from the trunks of trees in the genus ''

Nothofagus ''Nothofagus'', also known as the southern beeches, is a genus of 43 species of trees and shrubs native to the Southern Hemisphere, found across southern South America (Chile, Argentina) and east and southeast Australia, New Zealand, New Guin ...

,'' upon which

liverworts Liverworts are a group of non-vascular plant, non-vascular embryophyte, land plants forming the division Marchantiophyta (). They may also be referred to as hepatics. Like mosses and hornworts, they have a gametophyte-dominant life cycle, in wh ...

flourish as a result of the frequent rain that falls on the west coast and its off lying islands of New Zealand. The larvae were found to be hosted by the liverwort '' Pseudomarsupidium piliferum''.

Conservation status

This species is classified as "Data Deficient" under the

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q21349048 Micropterigidae Moths described in 2014 Endemic fauna of New Zealand Moths of New Zealand Taxa named by George Gibbs Endemic moths of New Zealand