Ethmia Hübner [1819]

Zhu, Xiaoju & Wang, Shuxia, 2022, Study of the genus Ethmia Hübner, [1819] (Lepidoptera: Ethmiidae) from China with descriptions of six new species, Zootaxa 5194 (2), pp. 176-192 : 177

Ethmia Hübner [1819]

Type species: Ethmia pyrausta Hübner, 1819.

Diagnostic characters. Small to large sized moths, with wingspan running from 10.0 to 50.0 mm. Adults of Ethmia can be distinguished by the grey, black, or white forewing ground colour, typically with dots, spots, stripes, or various combinations of these markings; in some species the forewing is unicolorous, such as the shiny greenish blue of E. cyanea Walsingham, 1912 , and the uniformly white of E. ustyurtensis Nupponen, 2015 . In the male genitalia, the uncus is usually well developed; the caudal part of the gnathos usually has a spined region, often extended as a shield-like plate, and the oral part usually bears a mostly finely spined region; the labis varies from narrow to broad; the cucullus, sacculus and costa of the valva are joined or conspicuously divided; and a cornutus is present or absent in the curved phallus. In the female genitalia, the apophyses anteriores are usually short, sometimes absent; the membranous ductus bursae is usually coiled; the appendix bursae is present or absent; and the signum is usually folded and dentate if present.