Mammifrontia sarae Mustelin, NEW SPECIES
Creators: name: Mustelin, Tomas
Publisher: name: Zenodo
Year: 2006
Subjects: Biodiversity
Taxonomy
Animalia
Arthropoda
Insecta
Lepidoptera
Noctuidae
Mammifrontia
Mammifrontia sarae

description: Mammifrontia sarae Mustelin, NEW SPECIES
Figs. 18, 50 a, 50b, and 79
Type material. Holotype: Male; Cottonwood Creek, 3 km south of Glencliff Fire Station, San Diego County, California, 1036 m, 12 July 2001, T. & S. Mustelin. Paratypes: 2 males, 2 females. San Diego County: Same data as holotype (1 female); same locality as holotype, 12 July 2004, T. & S. Mustelin (1 male); same locality as holotype, 3 July 2005, T. Mustelin (1 male, 1 female). Holotype, one female paratype, and genitalic slide #275/ TM deposited in SDNHM.
Etymology. This species is named after the author’s daughter, Sara Mustelin, who assisted in collecting the holotype and paratypes of this new moth.
Diagnosis. Superficially this species resembles both Benjaminiola colorada (Smith, 1900) and Mammifrontia rileyi Benjamin, 1936, perhaps the former more than the latter. By genitalic anatomy, however, it is much closer to M. rileyi (Fig. 51 a and 51b) and based on this I place it in the genus Mammifrontia Barnes & Lindsey, 1922. More specifically, Benjaminola colorada has a large and rectangular cucullus (Fig. 52 a and 52b), instead of the triangular shape in M. rileyi and M. sarae. In B. colorada, the vesica is tripartite, while it is much smaller and simple in shape in the two species of Mammifrontia. Mammifrontia sarae also differs from B. colorada in being smaller and less grayish and from M. rileyi in having a dark hindwing (Fig. 18 a), and it differs from both of them in having a more convex anterior forewing edge (Fig. 18 b), being more reddish tan and having a dark dot at the lower end of the otherwise invisible reniform spot (Fig. 18 c). Finally, sarae differs from B. colorada by flying in July, which is two or three months earlier than the first colorada emerge.
Description. Antenna filiform in male; eye naked, dark gray; palp dark brown laterally, head, frons, and patagium covered in brown hairs; tegula and thorax covered in pale reddish­tan hairs, dark brown hair tuft in midline behind patagium; venter pale tan with black dusting; legs concolorous; abdomen covered in pale tan short hair; venter concolorous; forewing length 13.5–14 mm; forewing ground color pale reddish­tan; weak gray dusting between veins; ordinary lines and spots missing, black dot in cell; fringe of ground color; ventral side pale grayish­tan; veins black dusted; discal spot absent. Hindwing pale grayish tan with heavy dark gray dusting between veins; discal spot absent; fringe pale grayish tan; ventral side pale grayish tan with dark gray dusting between veins; discal spot absent; fringe pale. Male genitalia (Figs. 50 a and 50b): Uncus stout; juxta broad with rectangular lateral appendages; sacculus stout, rounded; valve total length 2.8 mm, width at middle 0.55 mm, width before cucullus 0.75 mm, costal margin concave, outer margin straight; cucullus large and triangular with lateral projection and pointed apex, width 1.1 mm; digitus thin, length 0.4 mm, pointed dorsally; aedeagus slightly Scurved, length 2.5 mm, width 0.35 mm; everted vesica short round sack, 0.9 mm long, width 0.5 mm, with four larger and three smaller cornuti. Female genitalia (Fig. 79): Ovipositor lobes, 1.6 mm long, pointed and heavily sclerotized, small setae point forward; posterior apophyses 1.6 mm, anterior apophyses 1.1 mm; ductus bursae very short, 0.2 mm; corpus bursae 6.1 mm long, proximally 0.8 mm wide, constricted to 0.24 mm at 1/3 of length, then widening to 1.8 mm oval, faint longitudinal stripes; no appendix bursae, ductus seminalis arises from posterior side of corpus bursae near ductus bursae.
Distribution and habitat. This species is known only from the type locality, which is the middle of a permanent creek lined with cottonwood and willows.
description: Published as part of Mustelin, Tomas, 2006, Taxonomy of southern California Erebidae and Noctuidae (Lepidoptera) with descriptions of twenty one new species, pp. 1-47 in Zootaxa 1278 on pages 34-35, DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.273509