Pellucid Hawk Moth

Photograph No1 & 2 adjacent to a paddy field and a small stream, at altitude 1000m. Bandung, W. Java.

Photograph No3 House flower garden, altitude 250m. Ciranjang village, Cianjur, W. Java.

I don’t get to see these stunning daytime moths very often, and so it is always a special day if I get to capture one in pixels. Image No3 actually shows egg laying in progress. I should have photographed the eggs while I was there, sorry.

Sphingidae, Cephonodes hylas - pellucid hawk moth.

Melanogaster is quoted as the Indonesian sub species, but could not find photographic evidence of such.

Dave

Update ID - cephanodes picus. This is due to the orange color of the legs and the under thorax hairs. See following posts for full explanation.

Thanks to TL Seow for all the help.

The subspecies in Java is hylas ie. C. hylas hylas.
http://tpittaway.tripod.com/china/c_hyl.htm

Having said that ,there are two near identical species in your area.
The 2nd species is C. picus.
The definitive ID ,spines on the tibiae of the legs is near impossible to see.
However, the underside of the thorax & legs are tinged orange.

C. hylas. Note underside of thorax & legs are whitish.
http://www.jpmoth.org/~dmoth/Digital...es%20hylas.htm
http://www.ccs-hk.org/DM/butterfly/S...des-hylas.html
http://mw2.google.com/mw-panoramio/p...m/92055747.jpg
http://jdmyeepa.files.wordpress.com/...as-hylas11.jpg

C. picus. Note the underside of thorax & legs are orangey.
http://www.sphin-sea.unibas.ch/Sphin.../Cep_picus.htm
http://sphingidae.myspecies.info/sit..._female_up.jpg
http://sphingidae.myspecies.info/sit..._female_un.jpg

Your 3rd pix should be C. picus.

TL Seow:cheers:

Clearly it was my best decision joining this forum. I just hope you don’t lose patience with me, as I soak up all this information and learning. With this moth, you rarely get to choose a shooting angle, but I will endeavour to get the underside and legs if possible in future.

Taking the images one at a time:

Image 1 – a good original and was able to crop in on the leg, showing the spines (image below). This makes the ID cephonodes picus.

Image 2 – shot from some distance and over exposed. The thorax underside and legs definitely look white, but this could be as a result of over exposure. I would say inconclusive and identify as cephonodes cf hylas.

Image 3 – Lots of pixels, slight over exposure, taken in bright sunlight. But, the orange under thorax and orange legs do show through, so ID cephonodes picus, as you stated.

If you agree with this conclusion, I will copy and paste into the lead post.

Many thanks Mr Seow.

Dave

It is a particular set of spines on the tibiae of the forelegs.

The website's statement of orange tinge to the underside of the abdomen is in error ( should be thorax).
http://www.aus-lep.com/ThumListFam/S...es%20hylas.htm
http://www.aus-lep.com/ThumListFam/S...es%20picus.htm

In pix 1 the foreleg is orangey.
In pix 2 the thorax is orangey, but the legs appeared overexposed.
In pix 3 it is obvious.

I would say all three are Cephonodes picus.

TL Seow:cheers:

I have updated the lead post accordingly. Good job, learned a lot.

Dave