Megalota Diakonoff

Yu, Haili & Li, Baoguo, 2013, First record of the genus Megalota Diakonoff from China, with the descriptions of two new species (Lepidoptera: Tortricidae: Olethreutinae), Zootaxa 3641 (4), pp. 476-480 : 476-477

Megalota Diakonoff

Megalota Diakonoff, 1966: 52 .

Type species: Polychrosis fallax Meyrick, 1909 .

Megalota can be easily separated from other genera of Olethreutini by the forewing pattern and the male genitalia.

Detailed descriptions of the morphology of the genus were provided by Diakonoff (1966, 1973), Horak (1996, 2006), Aarvik (2004), and Brown (2009).

Based on the structure of the valva in male genitalia and the signum in the female genitalia, Brown (2009) recognized two species groups (the submicans group and the delphinosema group), but he also recognized two unassigned species and one “intermediate” species from the New World. Based on the male genitalia, the two species in this study should be of a new type of “intermediate” species, lacking the prominent incurved process near the middle of the valva and the elongate setae from the basal third of the valva which are asymmetric in length between the right and the left valva, but possessing a basal process of the valva that is less than 3 times as long as wide.