NEOTROPICAL MICROLEPIDOPTERA, III — CLARKE 73 



1948; one with no date, Fritz Plaumann) ; 3 cf cf , 9 , New Bremen (V-XI.1936, 

 1.1937, Fritz Hoffmann); 4 cT cT, 9, Santa Catarina (VI. 1935, V.1936, Fritz 

 Hoffmann) . 



This is the species treated by Fernando Bourquin in De Acta 

 Zoologica Lilloana, in which he described the hfe history and figured 

 the larva, pupa, and adult. He also illustrated an example of the 

 damage caused by the larva. Bourquin's use of the name "Hyper- 

 callia melobaphes" was based on a misdetermination by Meyi'ick. 



Because of the considerable intraspecific variation exhibited by the 

 genitalia, as well as exhibited superficially it is not surprising that the 

 species was misdetermined. In the long series before me there is 

 variation in the intensity of the color of the forewings, although the 

 pattern appears to be constant, and in some specimens, regardless of 

 locality, the hindwings are as dark as those of vexillata. In the males 

 the number of cornuti varies from three to five but there is no sugges- 

 tion that this variation reflects the locality. The signa also vary to 

 some extent but this also is not connected with locality. I am unable 

 to separate the various color forms. 



I am pleased to name this species for my friend Fernando Bourquin, 

 who has contributed so much to our knowledge of the life histories 

 of Argentine Microlepidoptera. 



Gonionota vexillata (Meyrick) 



Coptotelia vexillata Meyrick, 1913, Trans. Ent. Soc. London, 1913, p. 179. 

 Hypercallia vexillata (Meyrick), 1922, in Wytsman, Genera insectorum, fasc. 



180, p. 163, no. 42; 1930, Ann. Naturhist. Mus. Wien, vol. 44, p. 233 (as 



synonym of melobaphes). 

 Hypercallia melobaphes vexillata (Meyrick), 1926, Exotic Microlepidoptera, vol. 



3, p. 314. — Gaede, 1939, in Bryk, Lepidopterorum catalogus, part 92, p. 261. 

 Gonionota vexillata (Meyrick), Clarke, 1963, Catalogue of the type specimens of 



Microlepidoptera in the British Museum (Natural History) described by 



Edward Meyrick, vol. 4, p. 246, pi. 120, figs. 3-36. 



Meyrick described this species from two males and accorded it 

 full specific rank. In 1926 he wrote, under Hypercallia melobaphes 

 Walsingham: *T find . . . that vexillata Meyr. should be regarded as 

 a mountain form of this." The dark hind wing and genitalia readily 

 distinguish vexillata from melobaphes, and I have raised vexillata to its 

 appropriate specific status (Clarke, 1963). 



The abundant differences between the male genitalia of melobaphes 

 and vexillata are revealed by a comparison of figure la of this paper 

 with that of figure 36, plate 120, in the Meyrick work cited above. 

 The anellus of melobaphes has four pointed processes but that of 

 vexillata has none; the anellus of vexillata is similar to that of bourquini. 

 The clasper of vexillata is naked for most of its length and terminates 

 in a cluster of thick, long setae, sharply turned back toward the base 



