Pseudopostega tenuifurcata Davis & Stonis 2007

Pseudopostega tenuifurcata

ADULT. Figure 205. Length of forewing 2.3–2.5 mm. Small, mostly white moth with white forewings marked with 2 dark brown, subapical costal strigulae and a short, dark brown terminal, costal strigula; dark brown apical spot sometimes indistinct, usually confluent with outer costal strigula. Male with caudal lobe of gnathos attenuate and minutely furcate; basal fold broadly triangular (Figure 360). Female unknown.

Head: Vestiture white. Scape white; flagellum pale brown, ~47–52-segmented. Maxillary palpus cream. Labial palpus white to cream, suffused with grayish brown laterally.

Thorax: White; anterior margin of tegula grayish brown. Forewing almost entirely white with 2 dark brown, subapical costal, strigulae and a short, dark brown terminal, costal strigula; dark brown apical spot sometimes indistinct, usually confluent with outer costal strigula; strigula 1 broadest along costa, strongly oblique; strigula 3 extending distad to apical spot; strigula 2 usually confluent with darker apical spot, occasionally bypassing spot and confluent with strigula 3; an elongate, dark brown dorsal spot sometimes present along basal third of hind margin; terminal cilia mostly white between strigulae, around tornus, and along hind margin; brown beyond distal costal and terminal strigula; venter of forewing light to medium brown except for basal white area. Hindwing and cilia brown dorsally and ventrally except for white suffusion at base; apical cilia occasionally white. Legs mostly white; foreleg with dorsal surfaces suffused with brown; brown scaling more diffused on tarsomeres; midleg with usually brown bands dorsally on tarsomeres 3 and 4; tarsal banding paler to absent on hindleg.

Abdomen: Light golden brown dorsally, white ventrally, occasionally with brownish suffusion anteriorly.

Male Genitalia: Figures 360, 361. Socii a pair of relatively long rounded, setose lobes, widely separated by a distance ~0.75× length of cucullar lobe; caudal rim of uncus smoothly concave. Vinculum broad, tapering slightly to truncate anterior margin. Gnathos with a broad, triangular base tapering to form a slender, elongate, caudal lobe with a minutely furcate apex; anterior margin of gnathos subtruncate, slightly sinuate; basal fold present, moderately broad medially and narrowing laterally (Figure 360). Valva relatively short, length along sacculus ~0.55× length of entire genital capsule, with a moderately elongate cucullar lobe ~0.35× length of genital capsule, bearing a pectinifer consisting of ~28–30 blunt spines; distal apex of cucullar lobe slightly extended as an irregular, tuberculate, setose lobe; pedicel broad, approximately 0.23× length of cucullar lobe; saccular lobe moderately long, stout, tapering, bluntly rounded; basal process of valva relatively stout, short, slightly exceeding length of costal process. Juxta consisting of a slender, elongate, sclerotized, median rod from vinculum.

FEMALE, LARVA AND PUPA. Unknown.

HOLOTYPE. ♂; COSTA RICA: HEREDIA: Estación Biológica La Selva, Puerto Viejo de Sarapiqui, 10°26'N, 84°01'W, 50–150 m, Bosque secundario, L/18/547, 20 Jan 1999, INBio-OET, slide DRD 4191 (INBIO).

PARATYPES. COSTA RICA: HEREDIA: Estación Biológica La Selva, Puerto Viejo de Sarapiqui, 10°26'N, 84°01'W, 50–150 m, L/00/156: 1 ♂, 19 Feb 1996, INBio-OET, slide DRD 4183 (INBIO); L/08/359: 1 ♂, 22 Apr 1998, INBio-OET, slide USNM 32813 (USNM); L/10/325: 1 ♂, 3 Mar 1998, INBio-OET, slide DRD 4162, (INBIO); L/13/650: 1 ♂, 27 May 1999, INBio-OET, slide DRD 4205 (INBIO).

HOST. Unknown.

FLIGHT PERIOD. Adults have been collected from January to May.

DISTRIBUTION. (Map 14) Known only from the type locality, a lowland rainforest area in northeastern Costa Rica.

ETYMOLOGY. The species name is derived from the Latin tenuis (thin, slender) and furcatus (forked) in reference to the diagnostic attenuated, furcate structure of the caudal lobe of the male gnathos.

DISCUSSION. The nearly immaculate forewing of this species differs from the forewing of its proposed sister species, P. sectila, in lacking a subapical costal spot. The male genitalia of P. tenuifurcata differs markedly from P. sectila in possessing a basally broader gnathos, more slender (viewed laterally) caudal lobe, and more developed basal fold. The vinculum in tenuifurcata is more slender, with a truncate anterior margin, instead of deeply concave as in sectila.

Pseudopostega tenuifurcata is a moth of the family Opostegidae. It was described by Donald R. Davis and Jonas R. Stonis, 2007. It is known from a lowland rainforest area in north-eastern Costa Rica

The length of the forewings is 2.3–2.5 mm. Adults have been recorded from January to May.