NORTH AMERICAN ACROLOPHIDAE — HASBROUCK 501 



in regard to their characterization. The definition of the group, 

 based here only upon those species occurring in America north of 

 Mexico, is necessarily incomplete. 



The Acrolophidae constitute one of the more primitive families of the 

 nonaculeate Tineoidea. The species are distinctly frenate, the 

 frenulum of the male being a single, large bristle and that of the female 

 being divided into a number of smaller bristles. The basal segment 

 of the antenna is never enlarged or modified to form an eye-cap. 

 In the males, the basal segment of the labial palpus is relatively very 

 large in comparison to that exhibited by allied families. In the 

 male acrolophids, this segment is normally upcurved to the middle 

 of the front. 



Many of the species are large, robust moths resembling noctuids. 

 Others are small, fragile, and somewhat tortricid-like. The wing 

 expanse may range from about 10 mm. in the males of some of the 

 smallest species to about 40 mm. in the females of the largest species. 

 Both of these limits are quite easily exceeded when the many tropical 

 species are taken into consideration. In any one species, the females 

 are noticeably larger than the males. However, in a large series of any 

 one species, the largest male is commonly larger than the smallest 

 female. The coloration in both sexes is predominantly brown. 

 DifTerent shades of this color may be variously combined with smaller 

 amounts of white, yellow, gray, black, and red. The color pattern in 

 any one species is generally quite variable, and the pattern of the fe- 

 male tends to be less distinct or more suffused than that of the male. 

 A few species exhibit a rather marked dimorphism in color between 

 the two sexes. 



The head is retracted. The vestiture of the head, labial palpi, and 

 maxillary palpi is rough and very dense, consisting largely of scales 

 and spatulate hair. The ocelli are absent. The compound eyes are 

 medium-sized to rather large and they may be naked to very 

 densely setose in both sexes. In any one species, the eyes of the male 

 and the female exhibit approximately the same amount of vestiture. 

 The antenna has a somewhat globular scape. The antennal shaft is 

 smoothly covered on the dorsal surface with at least two rows of 

 scales to a segment. The lateral and ventral surfaces of the antenna 

 are finely pubescent with sensory hairs commonly overlaid with 

 additional scales. The antennae of the males may be simple to strong- 

 ly bipectinated, while those of the females are always simple and rel- 

 atively more slender. The mouthparts are wanting in both sexes, 

 the maxillae being simply fused into a small plate bearing a pair 

 of minute, 2-segmented maxillary palpi. This structure and its 

 palpi are normally covered by the much larger, upcurved labial palpi. 



