SMERINTHUS MINOR Mell, 1937

UK: Lesser Eyed Hawkmoth

Smerinthus minor Mell, 1937, Dt. ent. Z.: 5.

Type locality: Taipeishan [Taibai Shan, Qinling Mountains, southern Shaanxi], China.


BIOGEOGRAPHICAL AFFILIATION

Holarctic; eastern Palaearctic region. Pleistocene refuge: Monocentric -- probably the Sinotibetan refuge.


ADULT DESCRIPTION AND VARIATION

Wingspan: 70--80mm.


Smerinthus minor. (Photo courtesy of J.-M. Cadiou.)

ADULT BIOLOGY

A species of open scrub at 1700--2000m altitude.


FLIGHT-TIME

Univoltine; early June to early July.


EARLY STAGES

Unknown.


PARASITOIDS

Unknown.


DISTRIBUTION

A montane species found from the Taibai Shan area, western Qinling Mountains, Shaanxi Province, China (where it is not uncommon at 2000m altitude) eastwards along the Qinling to southern Shanxi Province and then north through that province (confirmed records from 2000m in the Taiyue Shan (=Mien Shan)) to just west of Beijing -- Yang (1978) records and illustrates a male specimen of this species (erroneously indentified as 'S. tokyonis' Matsumura) from the Miaofeng Mountains near Beijing. The Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Science, Beijing, also has a specimen in its collection from the Wuling Mountains, Hunan Province. (This species is not as scarce as once thought. There are 11 specimens in the collection of the Shaanxi Forest Science Institute, Yangling, and more than 10 at the Entomological Museum of the Northwest Agricultural University, Yangling).


Return to Hawkmoths of the western Palaearctic