__NOTOC__ The Tineodidae or false plume moths are a

family Family (from ) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). It forms the basis for social order. Ideally, families offer predictabili ...

of moths with in some cases unusually modified wings: Like in some related moths, the wings of several Tineodidae are decomposed into several rigid spines. This is a small family, with about a global total of 20

species A species () is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate sexes or mating types can produce fertile offspring, typically by sexual reproduction. It is the basic unit of Taxonomy (biology), ...

described to date; some undescribed species are known or suspected to exist however. They seem to be of

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 ...

n origin, where they are most diverse, but range through the

Wallacea Wallacea is a biogeography, biogeographical designation for a group of mainly list of islands of Indonesia, Indonesian islands separated by deep-water straits from the Asian and Australia (continent), Australian continental shelf, continental ...

Southeast The points of the compass are a set of horizontal, Radius, radially arrayed compass directions (or Azimuth#In navigation, azimuths) used in navigation and cartography. A ''compass rose'' is primarily composed of four cardinal directions—north, ...

and

South Asia South Asia is the southern Subregion#Asia, subregion of Asia that is defined in both geographical and Ethnicity, ethnic-Culture, cultural terms. South Asia, with a population of 2.04 billion, contains a quarter (25%) of the world's populatio ...

, and into the

Pacific The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean, or, depending on the definition, to Antarctica in the south, and is bounded by the cont ...

to the Marquesas Islands.

Description and ecology

These moths are usually small (with wingspans around 1–2 cm/less than 1 inch) and brownish in color. They have large

compound eye A compound eye is a Eye, visual organ found in arthropods such as insects and crustaceans. It may consist of thousands of ommatidium, ommatidia, which are tiny independent photoreception units that consist of a cornea, lens (anatomy), lens, and p ...

s, thread-like antennae, and prominent labial palps. The body is slender, and the legs bear large spines.. The amount of wing modification varies in this family. Some

genera Genus (; : genera ) is a taxonomic rank above species and below family as used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms as well as viruses. In binomial nomenclature, the genus name forms the first part of the binomial s ...

(e.g. '' Cenoloba'', '' Oxychirota'' and '' Tanycnema'') resemble plume moths ( superfamily Pterophoroidea), hence the common name "false plume moths". Others have little- or almost unmodified wings, and in some cases (e.g. '' Tineodes'') at a casual glance look like

snout moth The Pyralidae, commonly called pyralid moths, snout moths or grass moths, are a family (biology), family of Lepidoptera in the ditrysian Taxonomic rank, superfamily Pyraloidea. In many (particularly older) classifications, the grass moths (Cramb ...

s (family Pyralidae). The forewings may be simply drawn out to a slim point, or deeply divided into two narrow lobes. The hindwings are typically quite short, and may also be divided into two lobes.ABRS (2011) Feeding habits of the

caterpillar Caterpillars ( ) are the larval stage of members of the order Lepidoptera (the insect order comprising butterflies and moths). As with most common names, the application of the word is arbitrary, since the larvae of sawflies (suborder ...

larva A larva (; : larvae ) is a distinct juvenile form many animals undergo before metamorphosis into their next life stage. Animals with indirect development such as insects, some arachnids, amphibians, or cnidarians typically have a larval phase ...

e are not well known; while they all seem to feed on eudicots, there is no obvious preference for a particular lineage of these. Most Tineodidae larvae seem to be leaf miners as in closely related moth families. Those of '' Cenoloba obliteralis'' (and perhaps others) inhabit developing fruit instead, where they eat the young seeds.

Systematics and taxonomy

The relationships of this group are disputed, and they were in fact not even considered a possibly

monophyletic In biological cladistics for the classification of organisms, monophyly is the condition of a taxonomic grouping being a clade – that is, a grouping of organisms which meets these criteria: # the grouping contains its own most recent co ...

lineage for long. Initially, these moths were believed to be unusual

Pyralidae The Pyralidae, commonly called pyralid moths, snout moths or grass moths, are a family of Lepidoptera in the ditrysian superfamily Pyraloidea. In many (particularly older) classifications, the grass moths (Crambidae) are included in the Pyr ...

(snout moths) or Pterophoroidea (plume moths). Only in the late 19th century was their distinctness realized, yet they were not considered as a

group. Rather, the more unusual forms were treated as a distinct family Oxychirotidae. This was subsequently merged into the Tineodidae – which was originally established for the more conventional-looking false plume moths – when it became clear that the two groups are very close relatives. Tineodidae are here united with the

many-plumed moth __NOTOC__ The Alucitidae or many-plumed mothsToL (2003) are a family (biology), family of moths with unusually modified insect wing, wings. Both fore- and hind-wings consist of about six rigid spines, from which radiate flexible bristles creatin ...

s (family Alucitidae) the superfamily Alucitoidea. It may be that these two groups are actually

polyphyletic A polyphyletic group is an assemblage that includes organisms with mixed evolutionary origin but does not include their most recent common ancestor. The term is often applied to groups that share similar features known as Homoplasy, homoplasies ...

with regard to each other, and merging Tineodidae into Alucitidae and/or redelimiting the groups is warranted. In the taxonomic scheme used here, the closest living relatives of the Alucitoidea are considered the Pterophoroidea, but this is somewhat disputed. This would mean that the strong similarities between e.g. '' Tanycnema'' and the basal plume moth genus '' Agdistopis'' are not a coincidence. The alternative approach assumes the fruitworm moths (Copromorphoidea) are the closest living relatives of the Alucitidae, including the latter in an expanded Copromorphoidea with the fruitworm moths and the fringe-tufted moths (family Epermeniidae). In this scheme, the Alucitoidea do not exist, and the Tineodidae are included in the Pterophoroidea. Ultimately however, it is the affiliations of the Copromorphidae (which seem to be basal Obtectomera, somewhat more advanced than the others) which would decide which scheme to use.

Genera

The genera presently placed here, sorted alphabetically, are:Wikispecies (2010) * '' Anomima'' Turner, 1922 * '' Carcantia'' Walker, 1859 * '' Cenoloba'' Walsingham, 1885 * '' Epharpastis'' Meyrick, 1887 * '' Euthesaura'' Turner, 1922 * '' Euthrausta'' Turner, 1922 * '' Neoxychirota'' Clarke, 1986 * '' Oxychirota'' Meyrick, 1885 * '' Palaeodes'' Hampson, 1913 * '' Tanycnema'' Turner, 1922 * '' Tephroniopsis'' Amsel, 1961 * '' Tineodes'' Guenée in Boisduval & Guenée, 1854

Footnotes

References

* . Version of 2008-MAR-06. * Australian Biological Resources Study (ABRS) (2011): Australian Faunal Directory &ndash
Tineodidae
Version of 2011-MAY-11. Retrieved 2011-SEP-24. * Clarke, John Frederick Gates (1986): Pyralidae and Microlepidoptera of the Marquesas Archipelago. ''Smithsonian Contributions to Zoology'' 416: 1–485
PDF fulltext
(214 MB!) * Herbison-Evans, Don & Crossley, Stella (2010)

Version of 2010-MAY-11. Retrieved 2011-SEP-24. * Minet, Joel (1991): Tentative reconstruction of the ditrysian phylogeny (Lepidoptera: Glossata). ''Entomologica Scandinavica'' 22(1): 69–95. (HTML abstract) *

Tree of Life Web Project The Tree of Life Web Project (ToL) is an Internet project providing information about the diversity and phylogeny of life on Earth. This collaborative peer reviewed project began in 1995, and is written by biologists from around the world. The s ...

(ToL) (2003)
Alucitoidea
Version of 2003-JAN-01. Retrieved 2011-SEP-24. {{Taxonbar, from=Q902467