The caterpillars grow to a length of about 2.5 cms. Each pupates in a cocoon covered in soil.

(Photo: courtesy of Dick Whitford, Mt Molloy, Queensland)

The adult moths of this species have blotchy dark brown forewings, each with several pale blotches along the costa.

(Photo: courtesy of Dick Whitford, Mt Molloy, Queensland)

The hindwings are off-white, shading to dark brown at the margin. The moth has a wingspan of about 2.5 cms.

(Photo: courtesy of CSIRO/BIO Photography Group, Centre for Biodiversity Genomics, University of Guelph)

The species is found in Australia in

male, drawing by George Francis Hampson, listed as Tarache elaeoa,
Catalogue of Lepidoptera Phalænæ in the British Museum,
Noctuidæ, Volume X (1910), Plate CLXXII, fig. 10,
image courtesy of Biodiversity Heritage Library, digitized by Ernst Mayr Library, Harvard University.

underside
(Photo: courtesy of Dick Whitford, Mt Molloy, Queensland)

Further reading :

George F. Hampson,
Catalogue of the Lepidoptera Phalænæ in the British Museum,
Catalogue of the Noctuidae in the Collection of the British Museum,
Volume 10 (1910), p. 751, No. 6128, and also Plate 172, fig. 10.

Buck Richardson,
Tropical Queensland Wildlife from Dusk to Dawn Science and Art,
LeapFrogOz, Kuranda, 2015, p. 112.

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(updated 28 May 2013, 27 August 2023)