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"Meal moth" redirects here; not to be confused with "flour moth (disambiguation)".

Meal moth
Adult from above
The underwings have no conspicuous pattern
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Arthropoda
Class:	Insecta
Order:	Lepidoptera
Family:	Pyralidae
Genus:	Pyralis
Species:	P. farinalis
Binomial name
Pyralis farinalis (Linnaeus, 1758)

Pyralis farinalis, the meal moth, is a cosmopolitan moth of the family Pyralidae. Its larvae (caterpillars) are pests of certain stored foods, namely milled plant products.

It is the type species of the genus Pyralis, and by extension of its entire tribe (Pyralini), subfamily (Pyralinae) and family. Its synanthropic habits were noted even by 18th- and 19th-century naturalists, who described it using terms like domesticalis ("of home and hearth"), fraterna ("as close as a brother"), or the currently-valid farinalis ("of the flour").

At rest, adult moths (imagines) typically hold the tip of their abdomen at 90° to their body. Their upperwings are fairly colourful by moth standards, and have a wingspan of 18–30 mm. Adults fly from June to August. Adults do not live long after mating and eggs hatch quickly, which leads this moth to have a quick life cycle and be able to produce multiple generations within a single year.

In Great Britain and some other locations – particularly outside its natural range – it is mostly restricted to anthropogenic habitats of stored grain, e.g. barns and warehouses. However, it has been found in almond orchards among plant detritus and poultry farms among chicken manure.

P. farinalis is a species that is well adapted to living among humans and the urbanization that comes along with them. Though considered a pest to most since it can decimate grain storages, humans have found a use for this pesky moth. In Chinese culture it is the main ingredient of "insect tea." This drink is popular enough that scientists have been studying the moth's optimum growth conditions so they can possibly cultivate it for commercial use.

Geographic Range

Pyralis farinalis has been described as a "cosmopolitan" species, which means its range extends across most of the world. It is found all across the United States, but is mostly found along the eastern coast. This moth is most commonly seen in the Northeastern region. It is also found in Great Britain in the Falkland Islands and in China.

Habitat

P. farinalis is typically found in silos or other grain storage buildings where the grain is stored poorly and moisture is able to infiltrate the grain supply. Places where refuse vegetable matter is able to accumulate are more likely to house P. farinalis than grain storage buildings where the environment is clean and dry. P. farinalis prefers to live in detritus and has been found in non-urban areas in almond orchards. Meal moths can live in various habitats of damp, moist plant debris, but also even in poultry manure.

Food Resources

Caterpillar

As caterpillars, P. farinalis subsists mostly on cereals, but will also feed upon other types of grain and vegetables, such as potatoes. The meal moth's larvae are also interesting because they feed on all parts of the grain plant and do not seem to have any preference for one part of another. The larvae are equally likely to eat a cereal plant's seed, bran, husk, or straw.

Life History

Originally thought to be biennial species, it has been found that P. farinalis typically completes its entire life cycle in the course of eight weeks, and is capable of producing four generations within a year. Fast life cycles in these moths allow them to reproduce and grow their populations rapidly.

Life Cycle

Egg

The eggs of P. farinalis are ellipsoid in shape and very wrinkled with creases running lengthwise along the egg. These wrinkles form a reticulated pattern on the surface of the egg. Eggs are usually laid between two and five days after copulation and hatch after a nine day incubation period. Healthy females produce an average of 235 eggs in her lifetime.

Caterpillar

The larvae of P. farinalis spend most of their time out of sight of predators and humans. They live in tunnels of silk and meal particles which keep them safe from predators and they come to the openings of these tunnels to feed.

Pupae

Once fully grown, the caterpillars leave their tubes and spin a cocoon where they will develop into an adult. After 6-8 weeks the pupae will emerge as fully developed adults.

Adult

Adults were usually fully developed between 60-65 days after oviposition. Virgin adults would then mate as quickly as possible. Once mated, males and females would usually only live for nine to ten more days.

Enemies

Parsites

P. farinalis is parasitized by a number of species. These include:

• Meteorus ictericus
• Tetrasticus
• Lespidea tarsalis
• Apantales carpatus
• Goniozus columbianus
• Metacoelus mansuetos
• Melanophora roralis

Mating

Female/Male Interactions

Pheromones

An odd behavior that male meal moths exhibit is the attempt to mate with other species, such as Amyelois transitella. It is hypothesized that these two species share the sex pheromone (Z,Z)-11,13-hexa decadienal which female A. transitella use to attract males of their species. However, male P. farinalis are also attracted to this pheromone and will court and copulate with A. transitella females, but it is unlikely that offspring of these copulations would be viable.

Interactions with Humans

Pest of crop plants

Because of the meal moth's extensive appetite for cereals and grains, it is considered a pest by agriculturists. If grain is not stored properly, then a colony of meal moths can do considerable damage to the crop.

Agricultural use

One of the most surprising uses for P. farinalis is its use in producing "insect tea" in China. In China, the moth lives on the host plant of Litsea coreana and scientists have been studying optimum temperatures for which the moth is able to grow and develop best in the hopes of being able to cultivate the moths for insect tea.

References

• Grabe, Albert (1942): Eigenartige Geschmacksrichtungen bei Kleinschmetterlingsraupen ["Strange tastes among micromoth caterpillars"]. Zeitschrift des Wiener Entomologen-Vereins 27: 105-109. (in German)
• Kimber, Ian (2010): UKMoths – Meal Moth. Retrieved 12 April 2010.
• Savela, Markku (2009): Markku Savela's Lepidoptera and Some Other Life Forms – Aglossa. Version of 25 April 2009. Retrieved 12 April 2010.

Butterfly and Moth Pages Topic Order

This is a general outline that all pieces we write for Wikipedia on butterflies and moths can follow. All entries need not have all categories, but when they cover these topics they should fall in this order. It is also fine to put in extra categories relevant to your species in a place that makes sense to you.

Right hand Taxobox: On the right of the page should be the standard Wikipedia information for species, a photograph with the appropriate license, information on its systematics, distribution and conservation status.

Main page:

1)   Name of organism, scientific and common

a)   Meal moth

b)   Pyralis farinalis

2)   Lead section – This is the most important section of an article since many people will not read further and will use this paragraph to decide whether the piece is worth reading. It will summarize the article overall, emphasizing the important or novel aspects of this particular species, and mentioning any controversies. It should make it clear why this butterfly or moth is important. Anything mentioned here should be covered in more detail in the rest of the piece. You are likely to need to change this if it already exists but you are modifying the piece a lot. This section is usually about 4 paragraphs.

6)   Home range and territoriality

a)   male defense of places likely to attract females

b)   home range

c)    genetic population structure

s

i)    host plant preferences and selection (selection only possible for a few like army worms)

ii)  non-plant foods (e.g. predatory larvae)

iii) plant stimulants and deterrents to herbivory

b)   adults

i)    adult diet (e.g. nectar, feces, urine, corpses, tree sap, honey dew, pollen)

ii)  pollination

8)   Parental care

i)    Oviposition

ii)  Egg guarding

(1)  color

(2)  odor

9)   Social behavior

a)   Caterpillar sociality

b)   Adult sociality (e.g. social roosts, mud puddling)

b)   Senescence

11) Parasitic butterflies and moths

i)    Host

ii)  Mechanisms of overcoming host

12) Migration

a)   Local or regional dispersal

b)   Whole scale migration over long distances

13) Enemies,

a)   predators,

c)    diseases

d)   immunity

14) Protective coloration and behavior

a)   Cryptic and mimicking  color and behavior

b)   Batesian

c)    Müllerian

15) Genetics

a)   Subspecies

b)   Hybridization

c)    Genomes

16) Genetics of color patterns

a)   Pigmentation and structural coloration

b)   Genes

17) Mating

a)   Mate searching behavior

b)   male/male interactions

i)    lekking

ii)  displaying

iii) aggression

ii)  mate choice

iii) courting

iv)  copulation, number of mates

v)    nuptial gifts

18) Physiology

a)   Flight

b)   Vision

i)    Photoreceptors

ii)  Color vision

iii) Eye sexual dimorphism

c)    Olfaction (smell)

i)    Olfactory receptors

ii)  Odors

d)   Gustation (taste)

i)    Gustatory receptors

ii)  Sexual dimorphism in taste

e)   Hearing

i)    Sound generation

ii)  Hearing organs

f)    Thermosensation

g)   Thermoregulation

h)   Digestion

i)    Diapause

19) Microbiome

a)   Gut

b)   Specialized bacteria not in gut

20) Mutualism

a)   With plants

b)   With animals

c)    With microbes

21) Interactions with humans

b)   crop plant pollination

d)   pest of forests

e)   pest of beneficial insects

f)    citizen science

g)   beauty and art

22) Conservation

a)   Habitat loss

b)   Host plant or host organism issues

c)    Migration issues

d)   As indicators of overall habitat quality because of multiple life stages and complex dependencies

From Wikipedia Lepidoptera Project:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Lepidoptera#Format_for_article

Format for article

A suggested format for articles on Lepidoptera is given in the Article formats page.

See Moduza procris (commander) and Eacles imperialis (imperial moth) as examples of typical species accounts.

Some species have extremely little information and are little more than stubs, so most of these headings are deleted. See Parnassius imperator augustus (imperial Apollo) as an example. Such species in a single genus probably would merit consolidation in the near future, as per the accepted usage.

In some cases, the species has additional interesting information which merits separate sections and sub-sections. These are issues such as taxonomy, polymorphy, mimicry, ant-association, migration or any such feature characteristic to that species and warranting a detailed treatment by itself. Hence additional headings are provided on an as-required basis. The sequence of headings, sections and sub-sections may also be changed to represent the information in the best and most convenient manner possible.

See Danaus chrysippus (plain tiger) and Papilio polytes (common Mormon) as such examples.

This is the general outline from Wikipedia:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Lepidoptera/Article_formats

Look at this page for descriptions of the various parts. The Taxobox is essential, if there isn’t already one for your butterfly or moth.

• Taxobox
• Introductory paragraph
• Description
• Range
• Status
• Habitat
• Habits
• Life cycle. Comprises :

·      Egg

·      Caterpillar

·      Pupa

·      Imago

• Host-plants
• See also (for Wiki sites)
• References(printed material only)
• External links (for websites)