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Fairy Moths Lat. “Adelidae“
family of order “Butterflies and Moths“
1 family, 2 species

Fairy longhorn moths are part of the Adeloidea superfamily, which is considered primitive among moths. They have a sucking proboscis, a feature of advanced moths, and were previously classified under the Incurvariidae family. Resources like the Australian Faunal Directory and Fauna Europaea provide information on the Adelidae family, while studies like “Climate-induced changes in the microlepidoptera fauna” discuss the impact of climate on moth populations. External links offer keys and guides for identifying and learning more about Adelidae moths.

Hierarchy

Small Barred Longhorn

species of family “Fairy Moths“

Systematics

Fairy longhorn moths belong to the superfamily Adeloidea, one of the basal (“monotrysian”) branches of the advanced moth infraorder Heteroneura. By lepidopteran standards, they are thus still rather primitive micromoths. But like other Heteroneura, they already possess the apomorphic sucking proboscis – usually considered a defining feature of Lepidoptera, but the most ancestral moths still live on solid food which they chew. The Adelidae were previously placed as the subfamily Adelinae within the family Incurvariidae.

References

Davis, D. R. (1999): The Monotrysian Heteroneura. In: Kristensen, N. P. (ed.): Handbuch der Zoologie/Handbook of Zoology (Volume IV – Arthropoda: Insecta. Part 35: Lepidoptera, Moths and Butterflies 1): 65–90. Walter de Gruyter, Berlin & New York. ISBN 3-11-015704-7 Edwards, E. D. (2007): Australian Faunal Directory – Adelidae. Version of 28 June 2007. Retrieved 9 May 2010. Fauna Europaea (FE) (2009): Adelidae. Version 2.1, 22 December 2009. Retrieved 3 May 2010. Kuchlein, J. H. & Ellis, W. N. (2004): Climate-induced changes in the microlepidoptera fauna of the Netherlands and the implications for nature conservation. Journal of Insect Conservation 1(2): 73–80. doi:10.1023/A:1018483026265 PDF fulltext Savela, Markku (27 December 2018). “Adelidae Bruand, 1850”. Lepidoptera and Some Other Life Forms. Retrieved 4 March 2020.

UK Adelidae key Kimber, Ian. “Families: Adelidae”. UKMoths. Retrieved 4 March 2020. McLeod, Robin (25 September 2018). “Family Adelidae - Fairy Moths”. BugGuide. Retrieved 4 March 2020.

Ancestry Graph

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Further Information

Copyright

Wikipedia

This article uses material from the Wikipedia article Adelidae the free encyclopedia Wikipedia which is released under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License). On Wikipedia a list of authors is available.