Platyja togutila, Zilli & Vos, 2021

Zilli, Alberto & Vos, Rob de, 2021, The sumatrana species group of the genus Platyja with descriptions of four new species (Lepidoptera: Erebidae), Fragmenta entomologica 53 (2), pp. 391-410 : 403-404

Platyja togutila sp. n.

Description

Male (Figs 3-4)

Habitus. Forewing length 29-34 mm. Outward form and pattern as in P. subtracta sp. n. (described here above), but labial palpus with third joint longer.

Male genitalia (Figs 33-34, 52-53). Tegumen long and narrow, vinculum approximately as long as tegumen, V-shaped, with robust arms; valva comparatively slender, narrow at sacculus, widest at middle, and constricted at base of cucullus, saccular lobe broad-based with sharp-pointed, externally curved apex, cucullus edge with distinct finger-like apical process, median hump and more or less pronounced lobe at anal angle; juxta asymmetrical, consisting of paired strips separated midventrally by membrane, the left strip shorter, the right one terminated apically by small subtriangular process; uncus slightly arched ventrally, feebly incrassate before apical, recurved hook; tuba analis with long, narrow sclerotised scaphium. Phallus feebly arched, with shortly bilobed coecum, vesica with central, finely scobinate corpus and three main diverticula, longest and shortest ones tipped by stout terminal cornuti, and conical one with two main curved cornuti and stripe of smaller oners.

Female

Unknown.

Material examined. Type material. [ Indonesia: North Maluku Province]: Holotypus: ♂, Halmaheira, Toeelo (bought from E. Le Moult) (Rothschild Bequest 1939- 1), NHMUK014165469 , slide BMNH Noct. 6347, in NHMUK (Fig. 3) ;

Paratypus: ♂, 23 km SW of Tobelo, Tunuo Camp , 1°32’40”N 127°53’50”E, 19-22 Sep. 1995, at light, leg. De Jong & Ansari, RMNH. INS 1108646 , in RMNH.

Distribution. So far known only from Halmahera (North- ern Moluccas) ( Fig. 76 ).

Etymology. The species is named after the Togutil people inhabiting the island of Halmahera. The specific epithet is ad- jectivated in feminine gender agreeing with the generic name.

Diagnostic remarks. Externally indistinguishable from P. subtracta sp. n. and akin, though with longer third joint of labial palpi than P. subtracta , P. togutila is, unlike P. cyanocraspis , P. subtracta and P. yaleyambae sp. n., one of the species without awl-like sheath of phallus. Its saccular lobe is as shaped as in P. subtracta , P. yaleyambae and P. lecerfi , but its valval outline, slender, with narrow-necked and multilobed palmate cucullus, is most similar only to that of P. cyanocraspis , which however has rounded saccular lobes and, as noted above, sharply acuminated phallus. Its valval shape will also enable an easy distinction from P. vityaz sp. n. (described below).

Taxonomic remarks. Platyja togutila is very differently looking from the other Moluccan endemic from Buru and Seram of the group ( P. lecerfi stat. n.), and at a first glance seemed nothing but the westernmost peripheral isolate of P. subtracta sp. n., occurring already in Waigeo and the Birdshead Peninsula, but the genitalia differences leave no doubt about its status.

Figures

Fig. 76 – Distribution of species of the Platyja sumatrana-group (populations from New Britain and Rook Island [= Umboi, Siassi] combined as vityaz s.l.; see explanation in text).