I wanted to illustrate this colour of E.nisella which is not shown in the Sterling, Parsons Field Guide.
Recent DNA bar-codes of different colour forms show slight but consistent differences between the Poplar feeding group (now Epinotia cinereana) and the Willow feeding group (Epinotia nisella). Differences in both male and female genitalia have been found.
(Hancock, Bland, 2015)
From the latest A.B.H. checklist - "Prior to 2012 records of E nisella may include E. cinereana. E. cinereana has now been recognised as distinct from E. nisella: (Mutanen et al., 2012b)"
New ABH numbers are 49.255 E.nisella and 49.256 E.cinereana.
The photo below is of Epinotia nisella (Willow feeder). I hope this helps with anyone struggling with a brown Tortrix moth with a black/dark brown patch but this is still a variable moth!
Cinereana has actually been "re-instated". If you have access to Pierce & Metcalfe Tortricidae (1960) they are both in there. Then they were clumped together and now split again If you have any "nisella" that are just grey, they are candidates for cinereana and should be kept for me to look at. If they have dark areas like in Ina's photo, or brown on the wing, they will be nisella.
ReplyDeleteThanks Peter for putting that simply, my post started off as just a way of mentioning the dark patch ones weren't in the field guide whereas cinereana is, if only as a form.
Delete