page_title: Puriri moth
section_title: Taxonomy
hierarchical_section_title: Puriri moth / Taxonomy
caption_attribution_description: English: Female specimen of Aenetus virescens photographed by Birgit E. Rhode, Landcare Research.
context_page_description: The puriri moth, also commonly called the ghost moth or pepetuna, is a species of moth of the family Hepialidae. This moth is endemic to the North Island of New Zealand. It is New Zealand's largest moth, with a wingspan of up to 150 mm. It spends the first five to six years of its life as a grub in a tree trunk, with the last 48 hours of its life as a moth. Footage has been taken of a puriri moth chrysalis hatching over a period of one hour and forty minutes.
context_section_description: This species was first described in 1843 by Edward Doubleday in the book Travels in New Zealand by Ernst Dieffenbach. Doubleday named the species Hepialis uirescens. George Hudson discussed and illustrated this species under that name in his book The Butterflies and Moths of New Zealand. The moth is also commonly called the ghost moth or pepetuna.
caption: Aenetus virescens female LCR
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