Docleomorpha zhaoi Huang & Horie, 2025

Huang, Si-Yao, Horie, Kiyoshi & Espeland, Marianne, 2025, A review of the genus Docleomorpha Hering (Lepidoptera, Zygaenidae, Chalcosiinae) with descriptions of four new species, Zootaxa 5689 (1), pp. 155-164 : 163

Docleomorpha zhaoi Huang & Horie sp. nov.

Figs 12 & 19

Material examined. Holotype. male, “ZSY256 | Kina Balu ” / “ Borneo: Sabah | near Keningau, Mt. | Trus Madi , 1180 m, | 18–23.IV.2013 ” ( CHSY, will be deposited in a public collection later).

Diagnosis. Length of forewing 10 mm in male. Docleomorpha zhaoi sp. nov. can be distinguished from its congeners superficially by the small size and the reduced yellow patterns on both wings. In male genitalia, D. zhaoi sp. nov. can be easily distinguished from all the congeners by the conical uncus (rectangular in other congeners), the well-developed, rounded juxta with two dorsal blade-like processes, the presence of a weakly sclerotized plate above the ventral margin of valva and the sacculus with a L-like basal saccular process.

Description. External morphology of adult. Length of forewing 10 mm in male. Antennae black, bipectinate. Head, thorax and abdomen black dorsally and yellow ventrally. Abdomen with yellow rings between segments. Forewing ground color black with a prominent yellow spot situated at costa and an obscure yellow stripe situated right after the yellow spot, strongly suffused with black. Hindwing ground color black, the yellow patterns consisted of a reduced pale yellow stripe stretching along the costal area and a yellow, trapezoid spot situated in postdiscal area with its basal section obscure and suffused with black. Male genitalia. Uncus conical, bearing setae along lateral margin. Scaphium membranous. Tegumen trapezoid, slightly broader than uncus. Posterior bilateral projection bayonet-like. Vinculum moderately broad, nearly the same width of the tegumenal lobe. Juxta rounded, plate-like and bearing two blade-like processes dorsally. Saccus broad U-shaped. Valva broad (ca. 5 × uncus length) and short (ca. 2.5 × uncus length), costa stripe-like, simple; valvula membranous and fan-shaped, with setae sparsely scattered; a weakly sclerotized oval plate presented above the ventral margin of valvula; sacculus short (about 1.75 × uncus length) with its basal section bearing a L-like process. Phallus cylindrical and narrowed towards its distal end, with coecum well-developed.

Female is unknown.

Distribution. Malaysia (Borneo).

Etymology. The specific epithet zhaoi is named after Mr Mingzhi Zhao (ZFMK, Bonn, Germany), who helped the first author acquire the specimen. It is a noun in the genitive case.

Remarks. The placement of this species in the genus Docleomorpha is temporary. Although the wing patterns and shape resemble those of typical Docleomorpha , the details of juxta and valva are very different as already described above, and it is possible that this species should be transferred into a different genus. Nevertheless such assumption requires the evidence from molecular methods.

Figures

FIGURES 1–12. Adults of Docleomorpha spp. Depository of the specimens: 2 in SMF, 3, 5–9 in CKH; 4 in NHMUK (©The Trustees of NHMUK); 10 & 11 in MfN, 12 in CHSY. Scale bar for figures 2–12.

FIGURES 16–20. Male (16–19) and female (20) genitalia of Docleomorpha spp. Depository of the specimens: 16, 17 & 20 in CKH; 18 in MfN; 19 in CHSY.