158 BULLETIN 190, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



Paranthretig admiranda McDunnough, Check list of the Lepidoptera of Canada and 

 the United States of America, pt. 2, No. 8804, 1939. 



Male. — Antennae broadly bipectinate, fuscous, chestnut-red at bases. 

 Head brown-black, vertex strongly tufted, light brown ; face sordid white, 

 occipital fringe yellow, reddish black beneath. Collar sordid black, lower 

 edge yellow at the sides. Thorax brown-black, chestnut-brown at the 

 sides above wing base, tegulae touched with yellow on posterior part, 

 metathorax marked with yellow transversely ; yellow patches at wing base 

 beneath. Abdomen with basal segment brownish black; segment 2 nar- 

 rowly banded with black and chestnut anteriorly, broadly banded with 

 orange-yellow touched with blue-black posteriorly; segment 3 chestnut- 

 red, narrowly edged with black and shiny blue-black ; segment 4 orange- 

 yellow above and beneath, edged with black and shiny blue-black above ; 

 segments 5, 6, and 7 in the male type orange-red, edged with yellow, in 

 a second male brownish black ; anal tuft with four short blackish pencils, 

 the upper two twice as long as the lateral two. Legs orange-brown. 

 Forewing opaque, dull brownish black, with a slight mixture of yellow, 

 pale yellow at base ; underside flushed with yellow toward apex, hind- 

 wing transparent, veins and margin dull brown-black; between veins 3 

 and 4 a partial suffusion of brown-black scales, vein Ic much thickened 

 to apex ; wing base and inner margin basally orange-red. 



Female. — Very much like the male but larger. Antennae simple, 

 orange dusted with black above. Anal tuft elongate, rounded, dull 

 brown-black. Hindwing densely suft'used between veins 2 and 3 beyond 

 discal mark. 



Expanse : Male 25 to 30 mm., female 34 mm. 



Distribution. — Texas. 



Type. — Male. In the American Museum of Natural History. 



Remarks. — Known from only three specimens, the male type col- 

 lected by J. Ball, presumably near his home at Dallas, Tex., and a male 

 and a female (United States National Museum) collected by H. B. Parks 

 at San Antonio, Bexar County, Tex., July 3, 1931, and June 4, 1924, 

 respectively. Mr. Parks captured his examples along open roadside 

 hedges composed principally of wild grape and Ampelopsis, the most 

 probable food plants. Search for larvae and their work by Mr. Parks 

 and the writer has not been successful. Excavating in such hedgerows 

 among cacti, poison-ivy, and other obnoxious plants is a hazardous job, 

 especially since such thickets are notorious hiding places for the Texas 

 diamondback rattlesnake. Structural characters definitely place admir- 

 anda in the genus Vitacea. It is apparently more closely related to scepsi- 

 formis than to polistijormis. 



Genus GAEA Beutenmiiller 



Larunda Hy. Edwards, PapiHo, vol. 1, p. 182, 1881. (Preoccupied.) (Genotype, 

 Larunda solituda Hy. Edwards.) 



