Large Unknown Australian Moth

bugman

April 26th, 2009 at 10:33 am

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Is this a Bogan moth?
Fri, Apr 24, 2009 at 5:27 AM
Came home tonight during the rain, found this little bird shaking its wings in the corner. It was very dark, and I initially thought it was a bit of plastic shaking in the wind, except there was no wind.
I’ve seen many big moths, we are in a bogan migration path apparently (Canberra Australia) but I’ve never anything this big before, and its tail seemed fatter than Im used to seeing. Just wanted to know if its size was unusual, and what type of moth it is.
Feel free to keep/use the pics if they’re interesting. I have a short movie clip of it shaking its wings, but its very dark.
Ken
Canberra Australia

Unknown Moth

Hi Ken,
While it looks vaguely Sphinxlike, we do not believe your moth is a Hawkmoth in the family Sphingidae. We did a cursory search on the Csiro Australian Moth site, but had no luck. We have found references to Bogan Moths being eaten in Australia, but the photos seem to be of widely differing species. We haven’t the time to more fully research your question right now, and it is our hope that some reader will provide an answer.

Unknown Moth

Comment: Mon, Apr 27, 2009 at 6:50 PM
Try Hepialidae, a lot of Australian ones look like chubby awkward sphinx moths, maybe Abantiades sp.

We researched this on Csiro Entomology page and found a likely Abantiades hydrographus and Abantiades marcidus.

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Comments 4

MikeH wrote:
Try Hepialidae, a lot of Australian ones look like chubby awkward sphinx moths, maybe Abantiades sp.
Posted 27 Apr 2009 at 9:50 pm ¶
dynastes23 wrote:
I’ve seen these before ,its a giant wood boring moth from austrialia cossidae family subspecies
XYLEUTES or ENDOXYLA cant tell. Your moth is female hope this helps
Posted 29 Apr 2009 at 10:24 pm ¶
dghewitt wrote:
Just as a matter of interest – the moths around Canberra are Bogong (not bogan) moths – Agrotis infusa.
Posted 01 May 2009 at 6:04 pm ¶
embaus wrote:
Hi WTB, ROFL -query should have been about a BogonG Moth not a Bogan Moth (would love to see the latter: sporting a mullet, wearing acid-wash stretch denim jeans and uggs driving a clapped-out Commodore…). Moth named after Mt Bogong:
http://australianmuseum.net.au/Bogong-Moth
Bogan is a pejorative social descriptor: http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=bogan

This moth looks a bit too big to be a Bogong moth. If Ken really is in a bogan migration path he is very unfortunate.
Posted 18 Aug 2009 at 7:17 pm ¶