JOHN B. SMITH, SC.D. 



363 



ReTision of the Species of Pleonectyptera Grt. 



BY JOHN B. SMITH, SC. D. 



(Plate XI) 



This genus was described by Mr. Grote in 1872 (Trans. Amer. 

 Ent. Soc, iv, 23, and two new species, geometralis Grt. and phalce- 

 nalis Grt. were associated with Hemeroplanis pyralis Hbn., to make 

 it up. At about the same time, tliough published a little later, 

 Zeller described his genus Coptocnemia in the Verhandlungen de k. 

 k. Zool. bot. Gesellschaft, xxii, 476, and on pi. 1, fig. 19, figured 

 some of the structural peculiarities of his species /occa^is. The type 

 of that species I saw later, at Cambridge, and found it to be the 

 same as the species identified as pyralis by Mr. Grote. 



The generic characters are: eyes naked, large, globose, without 

 overhanging cilise or lashes. Front normally convex, not specially 

 modified ; vestiture hairy and tending to form a little pointed frontal 

 tuft, enhancing the snout-like efl^ect of the palpal structure. Palpi 

 oblique, the second joint longest, clavate, a little flattened trans- 

 versely, the tip obliquely truncate, but with the angles rounded ; 

 terminal joint moderate, cylindrical, obtusely terminated, set into 

 the second joint so as to project straight forward or even to droop a 

 little. Tongue well developed, functional. Antennse simple in 

 both sexes or with moderate ciliations in the male. Thorax small, 

 convex; collar and patagia not marked, closely appressed ; vestiture 

 flattened hair and scales, smooth, forming no tufts. Abdomen cylin- 

 drical, elongate, tapering, well extended beyond the hind angles of 

 the secondaries, closely scaled, without dorsal or lateral tuftings. 

 Legs long, slender, unarmed, except for the usual spurs of mid and 

 hind tibiae, the latter not spinose. In the males the middle or pos- 

 terior tibise may or may not be thickened and provided with sexual 

 tufts, and at the base of the abdomen in the same sex there may or 

 may not be a pair of lateral hair pencils. Wings proportionate, 

 closely scaled ; primaries, veins 3, 4, 5 well separated from end of 

 median, 6 almost directly continuing subcostal from the lower angle 

 of accessory cell, 7 and 8 from end of accessory cell, 9 out of 8 near 

 apex, 10 out of upper angle of accessory cell. In the males of some 

 species the subcostal is unusually remote from the costal margin, and 



TKANS. AM. ENT. SOC. XXXIII. DECEMBER, 1907. 



