Common Moths Australia

Added to this many moths have yet to be collected and named whereas very few butterfly species remain to be discovered in australia.

Common moths australia. Photos and facts about the moths of australia. The australian museum has hundreds of moths and butterflies donated in the 1860s by alexander walker scott and his daughters helena and harriet. Its scientific name is elhamma australasiae and it is a species of the hepialidae family. The situation is very different from that in europe and america where most common moth species have.

Moths of australia common 1990 melbourne university press provides a wealth of information on australian moths treating all families and illustrating a number of frequently encountered species. The family hepialidae commonly known as ghost and swift moths contains some of the largest and most obvious australian moths. These were collected during their research for aw scotts two volume book australian lepidoptera and their transformations. A z list of insects lepidoptera.

In comparison there are only 400 species of australian butterfliesthe moths mostly nocturnal and butterflies mostly diurnal together make up the taxonomic order lepidopterascientifically these moths are organised into about 80 families but the status of some is controversial and several recent changes have. In australia there are over 10000 named species of moths compared with only about 416 species of butterflies. Even the moth families are usually referred to in australia by derivatives of their scientific names. Moths of australia by ifb common published january 1990.

Their is a dark semicircular patch on the inner edge of each forewing. Australian moths represent between 20000 and 30000 different types of moths. Buy moths of australia from csiro publishing online. The common eupselia moth is a greyish brown colour.

Mcquillan pb and forrest ja 1985 a guide to common moths of the adelaide regionspecial educational bulletin series no. The isbn is 9780643101227. Actually very few australian moths have english common names as there have been only 200 years or so of english settlement in australia. The publisher is csiro publishing.

The forewings are greying with darker grey brown neat the tips. They are not very large in size and they normally grow up to an average length of 10 mm while their wingspan is almost 20 mm. South australian museum adelaidea good quick reference to many south australian moths with colour and bw images although some scientific names are no longer correct.