Cidariini, Duponchel, 1845

Young, Catherine J., 2006, Molecular relationships of the Australian Ennominae (Lepidoptera: Geometridae) and implications for the phylogeny of the Geometridae from molecular and morphological data, Zootaxa 1264 (1), pp. 1-147 : 1-147

Cidariini and Xanthorhoini

In this analysis, the linking of the Australian xanthorrhoine Acodia pauper and the Nearctic cidariine Ecliptoptera silaceata as sister species is moderately well supported. Acodia Rosenstock consists of three species that are widespread in Southern Australia. A. pauper is a moderately small, cryptically patterned moth with forewings pale brown with numerous, wavy, transverse fasciae coloured in different shades of brown. Hindwings are similarly patterned but paler. Larvae feed on Coprosma J.R. & G. Forst. The pairwise distance between the two species from the 28S D2 data is 7.8% (Appendix 6). The sister relationship between the Cidariini and the Xanthorhoini was suggested by Forbes (1948), McGuffin (1958), Herbulot (1961 –62), Vidalepp (1977), Inoue (1982), Hodges et al. (1983) and more recently Choi (1997).

In Choi’s morphological cladistic analysis of the Cidariini , characters generally shared by both tribes were as follows:

—frons projected ventrally; two accessory cells in forewing; sexual tufts on male forewings; hooked, sclerotised, thick and long uncus; small anellus lobes; hairs of costa absent or bunched; hairs on cucullus; large number of cornuti on the vesica.

Xanthorhoine (sensu Herbulot 1961 –62) species used by Choi were three species of Xanthorhoe Hübner and Catarhoe cuculata Hüfnagel. The morphological characters of A. pauper do not suggest a close relationship with the Cidariini and none of the above characters, apart from the last, is present in this species.

However a few genitalic characters unite A. pauper (Figs 18–20) and E. silaceata :

—an acute uncus (Fig. 18); a rounded aedeagal apex (Fig. 19); bursa copulatrix not clearly differentiated into ductus bursae and corpus bursae (Fig. 20).

The eggs of Acodia orina (Fig. 21) and E. silaceata ( Salkeld 1983) also show little similarity but both have broad cell walls, concave cells and small aeropylar openings.