Feltia submontana (Noctuidae, Noctuinae): Redescription, Taxonomy, Life Cycle, and Spatial Distribution of a Neglected South American Potential Pest Species

Abstract

Feltia submontana (Köhler, 1961) is redescribed based on specimens from Northwestern Argentina and Central and Southeastern Brazil. Taxonomic comments, photographs of the adults, characters of taxonomic importance, and illustrations of structures of the labial palpus, legs, and male and female genitalia are provided. The species is compared with similar-looking and supposedly closely related species, such as F. hispidula (Guenée, 1852) and F. lilacina (Zerny, 1916). The species, originally described for Argentina, is reported for Brazil for the first time. Most Brazilian specimens come from the "Cerrado" but also from Southeastern Atlantic Forests. The life cycle of F. submontana specimens collected in Planaltina, Distrito Federal, Brazil, is described; the species probably has only a single generation per year and imagines are on the wing in the late autumn and early winter months; the last instar prepupa and pupa pass through aestival diapause. The abundance of F. submontana relative to other species of Agrotis Ochsenheimer, 1816, and Feltia Walker, 1856, in the above-cited locality is accessed through 4 years of standardized collecting with light trap; the species is the second most abundant species of these genera in the area, with about one fifth of the captures, second only to A. ipsilon (Hufnagel, 1766), with about two thirds of the captures, and about two times more abundant than F. subterranea (Fabricius, 1794); the latter two are regarded as important pest species in South America.

The Granulate Cutworm (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae): Biological Parameters Under Controlled Conditions, Host Plants, and Distribution in the Americas

“…Misidentification of F. subterranea with other species, such as F. submontana (Köhler, 1961) in Brazil ( Dias et al 2019 ), and F. lutescens (Blanchard, 1852) and Pseudoleucania anteposita (Guenée, 1852) in Argentina and Chile are reported. Feltia lutescens and P. anteposita were considered synonyms of F. subterranea , corresponding to some of the southern most records assigned to the species in the literature.…”

“…Furthermore, F. lutescens is restricted to the extreme south of South America, with its northern most records in Santiago, Chile and Neuquén, Argentina ( Jana-Sáenz 1989 ), farther south than all known records of F. subterranea . Feltia subterranea is comprehensively distinguished from F. submontana by Dias et al (2019) .…”

“…As expected, there is a significant difference (of about 100 mg) between the average weight of the male and female pupae ( Table 4 ). The difference is probably a manifestation of the sexual dimorphism ( Lafontaine 2004 ) observed in some Noctuinae, including in species of Feltia ( Specht et al 2013 , Dias et al 2017 , 2019 , San Blas and Agrain 2017). It is interesting to note the variation in pupal weight between individuals, especially females, where the heaviest pupa is twice the weight of the lightest one ( Table 4 ).…”

“…Specimens and their genitalia preparations were compared with illustrations of the species provided by Lafontaine (2004) and illustrations of the female type deposited at the Zoological Museum, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark (ZMUC). Dissections of the genitalia were conducted as shown in Dias et al (2017 , 2019 ) and San Blas et al (2019) .…”

“…In the referred countries, the distribution of these similar cutworms overlaps with that of F. subterranea , making misidentifications frequent (cf. Artigas 1974 , Biezanko et al 1974 , Klein and Waterhouse 2000 , Angulo et al 2008 , Dias et al 2019 ).…”