The Moths of India website has 700 species

Hello everybody,

The Moths of India website has now reached 700 species, an incredible journey in less than two years. The website has also recorded more than 6,500 unique visitors, a number that is growing weekly, and bodes well for growing the “moth-ers” community in India and elsewhere. Even more encouraging is the number of contributors has increased, and many different people have started uploading moth species on the website.

Interesting records include

Comostola hauensteini, a new species described only in 2004. MOI website reports the first records from Paschimbanga and Arunachal Pradesh for this species.
http://www.mothsofindia.org/sp/356112/Comostola-hauensteini

The lovely day-flying moths Dysphania percota and Dysphania nelera. The website now has 4 species of Dysphania. 

http://www.mothsofindia.org/sp/356085/Dysphania-percota

http://www.mothsofindia.org/sp/356086/Dysphania-nelera

among many others.

Thanks to all the contributors and reviewers for making this happen.

And we are happy to report another sister website based on the architecture of these websites, http://www.indianreptiles.org/home.

The Moths of India team
http://www.mothsofindia.org/website-teams

Moths of India reaches 600 species

The Moths of India website has reached 600 species, an amazing achievement in just over 15 months since we went live. Some interesting moths posted in the last few months are...

 

The Zygaenid moth Psaphis euschemoides http://www.mothsofindia.org/sp/355920/Psaphis-euschemoides, which is an amazing mimic of another day flying Geometrid moth, the False Tiger MothDysphania militaris http://www.mothsofindia.org/sp/355022/Dysphania-militaris. Or is it the other way around?

 

 

The incredibly beautiful Zygaenid moth Campylotes-desgodinsi http://www.mothsofindia.org/sp/35591 2/Campylotes-desgodinsi

 

The Sea Buckthorn Hawkmoth Hyles hippophaes http://www.mothsofindia.org/sp/355943/Hyles-hippophaes, previously known from India only by a single specimen collected by Avinov in 1912. 

Orthobrachia hirowatarii, a species described in 2016 from China and Thailand, reported in India for the first time at http://www.mothsofindia.org/sp/355935/Orthobrachia-hirowatarii

 

The other highlight is that the number of contributors has increased to 40.

Keep “mothing" and contributing!

The Moths of India team

Moth of India website :: Updates September 2016

by Sanjay Sondhi

The moth website keeps chugging along, and with 510 species, 17 life cycles, 1169 images viewed by 3,002 unique visitors, we are off to a great start, given that the website  went live only a year ago in September 2015. What better way to celebrate this with an amazing moth, Dasysphecia bombyliformis which can be viewed through the link below. 

http://www.mothsofindia.org/sp/355781/Dasysphecia-bombyliformis

This clearwing moth is mimicking a bumble bee Bombus breviceps or perhaps the Hornet Vespa tropica. I mistook the same for a bee/hornet till Geetha Iyer pointed out that it may be a Sesiid. Ian Kitching confirmed that the Natural History Museum, London has only two specimens including the holotype. Type locality is in the Khasi Hills, Meghalaya collected in June 1895, described by Rothschild in 1911.

Enjoy viewing the moth, and we would welcome more contributions from people to the website.