Biota

Exploring Nature

Superfamily Bombycoidea

Kingdom: Animalia > Phylum: Arthropoda > Class: Insecta > Order: Lepidoptera > Superfamily: Bombycoidea

This is an ecologically diverse superfamily of moths that contains the silk moths, emperor moths, sphinx moths, and similar. These are generally large or very large with the males having comb-like antennae. There have been some changes and some families of moths have now been moved to separate superfamilies so that now only ten families are included under this superfamily[1]. Click the button to see a list of all the families and subfamilies in this superfamily.

  1. Family Anthelidae# (94)
    1. Anthelinae
    2. Munychryiinae
  2. Family Apatelodidae# (182)
  3. Family Bombycidae (silkworm moths) (202)
    1. Bombycinae
    2. Epiinae
  4. Family Brahmaeidae (68)
  5. Family Carthaeidae (1)
  6. Family Endromidae (70)
  7. Family Eupterotidae (396)
    1. Eupterotinae
    2. Ganisa group
    3. Hibrildinae
    4. Janinae
    5. Panacelinae
    6. Striphnopteryginae
  8. Family Lemoniidae##
  10. Family Phiditiidae# (23)
  11. Family Saturniidae (giant silkworm moths) (3,454)*
    1. Agliinae
    2. Arsenurinae
    3. Ceratocampinae
    4. Cercophaninae
    5. Hemileucinae
    6. Oxyteninae
    7. Salassinae
    8. Saturniinae
  12. Family Sphingidae (hawk or sphinx moths) (1,602)*
    1. Macroglossinae
    2. Smerinthinae
    3. Sphinginae

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# Not currently listed as a family here in the Catalogue of Life (CoL)
## In CoL but not included in recent list (see ref. 1 below)
* Families where I have photos.

I have shown the country where the photo was taken, or where the species originates, in parenthesis. The tropical ones from various butterfly houses will be marked GH.

Family Saturniidae (giant silkworm moths)

This family includes some of the largest species of moths.  Most of these were seen at a butterfly farm but I also saw a few in Trinidad. The caterpillar was found locally. The Emperor moth is the only species of this family found in the UK. I would love to see the adult moth.

Subfamily Saturniinae

  1. Actias dubernardi, Chinese moon moth (GH – China)
  2. Actias isabellae, Spanish moon moth (GH – Spain)
  3. Argema mittrei, comet moth or Madagascan moon moth (GH – Madagascar)
  4. Attacus atlas, atlas moth (GH – Asia)
  5. Copaxa denda (GH – Mexico)
  6. Nudaurelia krucki (syn Imbrasia krucki), African golden emperor (Africa)
  7. Samia cynthia, Eri Silkmoth, or Ricini Moth (GH – Asia)
  8. Saturnia pavonia, emperor moth – caterpillar (UK)

Subfamily Hemileucinae

  1. Automeris io, io moth (GH – Americas)
  2. Automeris liberia, bullseye moth (Trinidad)
  3. Citheronia hamifera (Trinidad)
  4. Lonomia achelous (Centrail & South America)

Subfamily Ceratocampinae

  1. Eacles imperialis, imperial moth (Trinidad)

Family Sphingidae (hawk-moths)

They can be found world wide but these were all found out and about in the UK, Norway and France. 

Subfamily Macroglossinae

  1. Deilephila elpenor, elephant hawk-moth (UK)
  2. Hyles euphorbiae, spurge hawk-moth  – caterpillar (France)
  3. Hyles gallii, bedstraw hawk-moth  – caterpillar (Norway)
  4. Macroglossum stellatarum, humming-bird hawk-moth (UK & France)

References

  1. Kitching I, Rougerie R, Zwick A, Hamilton C, St Laurent R, Naumann S, Ballesteros Mejia L, Kawahara A (2018) A global checklist of the Bombycoidea (Insecta: Lepidoptera). Biodiversity Data Journal 6: e22236. https://doi.org/10.3897/BDJ.6.e22236