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WING COLOURATION DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE BRUCE SPANWORM OPEROPHTERA BRUCEATA (HULST) (LEPIDOPTERA: GEOMETRIDAE) AND THE WINTER MOTH OPEROPHTERA BRUMATA (L.) ON VANCOUVER ISLAND

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  31 May 2012

Kenneth A. Pivnick
Kenneth A. Pivnick
Affiliation:
Plant Biotechnology Institute, National Research Council Canada, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada S7N 0W9
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Extract

In a recently completed study involving pheromone trapping of the winter moth, Operophtera brumata (L.), and the Bruce spanworm, O. bruceata (Hulst), on Vancouver Island (Pivnick et al. 1988), I noticed that O. bruceata had wing colouration different from sympatric O. brumata. The west coast O. bruceata has a pale yellow-orange costal margin on the underside of the forewings and this is faint to absent in O. brumata (Fig. 1). It is also absent from O. bruceata in Saskatoon, which is interesting because some authors consider the west coast population of O. bruceata to be a separate species: the western winter moth, O. occidentalis (see Ferguson 1978; Pivnick et al. 1988). Descriptions of O. bruceata (Brown 1962) and O. brumata (Cuming 1961), and a taxonomic key to these two species (Eidt et al. 1966), do not mention any distinctive wing markings that could be used to separate the two species.

Type
Articles
Information
The Canadian Entomologist , Volume 120 , Issue 7 , July 1988 , pp. 697 - 698
Copyright
Copyright © Entomological Society of Canada 1988

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References

Brown, C.E. 1962. The life history and dispersal of the Bruce spanworm, Operophtera bruceata (Hulst) (Lepidoptera: Geometridae). Can. Ent. 94: 1103–1107.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
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Pivnick, K.A., Barton, D.L., Millar, J.G., and Underhill, E.W.. 1988. Improved pheromone trap exclusion of the Bruce spanworm Operophtera bruceata (Hulst) (Lepidoptera: Geometridae) when monitoring winter moth Operophtera brumata (L.) populations. Can. Ent. 120: 389–396.CrossRefGoogle Scholar