Agrotis epicremna

The owlet moth

Agrotis is a genus of owlet moths. Adults fly at night; many larvae are cutworms that feed on low plants. Island species in this genus often have nowhere else to go.

Owlet moths are a huge noctuid family. Adults are typically dull, night-flying moths; the larvae feed on plants.

Range and habitat

Endemic to the Hawaiian Islands, it is known from Kauaʻi, Molokaʻi, and Maui, even so, it has not been recorded from Kauaʻi or Molokaʻi since 1981 and 1979 respectively.

Pins are Wikidata “endemic to” fields. Orange dots, when present, are GBIF occurrence tiles — survey bias included.

Diet

Adult owlet moths come to light. Caterpillars of many species feed on grasses or herbs; island moths may have used a single native plant.

The adult is what most collections hold. The larva — the feeding stage — is often undescribed for the rarest names.

In crisis

Named moths and butterflies with a high threat category are often known from a small range and a thin series. Host-plant loss leaves little to recount.

Agrotis epicremna is Endangered on this catalog because that is the IUCN category stored on Wikidata. Confirm the official criteria and any later count on iucnredlist.org.

Sources

Written for this catalog from the English Wikipedia article on Agrotis epicremna — often a short stub, Wikidata item Q4694336. Family and order context is original field-guide writing about the group, not a copied assessment of this one species. Wikipedia text is CC BY-SA. Not an IUCN assessment. Counts, when quoted, can change — confirm them on the recovery programme and on iucnredlist.org.