Plutodes Guenee 1858

Genus Plutodes Guenée, [1858]: 117

TS: Plutodes cyclaria Guenée, [1858]

TL: Borneo (Malaysia)

Species of Plutodes, now in Plutodini, Ennominae, are small to medium-sized moths with an overall dull yellow appearance. Their wings usually have yellow ground colour with a prominent pattern of basal and distal rufous-brown patches where the distal ones are generally roundish or elliptical, and traversed by a crenulate darker line inside. The distal patches are often bordered by double, fine dark lines with iridescent scales sprinkled in the space between them. The antennae in both the sexes are generally unipectinate. The forewing venation comprises R1 originating subapically from the cell or rarely from the common stem of R 2–5, remaining independent in the core-group or fusing with Sc for a rather long distance before diverging from it. R2 always arises from the common stem of R 3–4. Sţning (2013) identified the drop-shaped basal section of the frenulum in Plutodes which is a synapomorphy for all the allied genera in Plutodini. The male genitalia have slender uncus with a rounded, spatulate or acute apex, valvae with weakly or strongly sclerotized costa and well-developed sacculus possessing subbasal and distal spurs or other processes and weakly developed saccus, curved upwards. Juxta broad, plate-like or elongate, laterally near base with a pair of bunches of elongate setae (“cristae”). The vesica of the aedeagus bears a row or bunches of variable cornuti. The female genitalia have corpus bursae devoid of typical Ennominae signum, but usually with scobination, often arranged in lines.

Plutodes is mainly distributed in the Oriental tropics and subtropics with geographic range extending from the North-western Himalaya to the Indo-Australian tropics, with maximum diversity being reported from Thailand and the Sunda islands of Borneo and Sumatra. A few species reach to a little higher latitude in the Fujian and Yunnan provinces of China, just touching the southernmost extremity of the Palaearctic realm (Yazaki & Wang 2004, Sţning 2005). Generally, the species of this genus are found in the lowland and lower to upper montane, undisturbed tropical and subtropical forests up to an altitude of nearly 2500 m.