Moths + Buterflies of British Columbia, Visual Lists

Sometimes it's useful to browse species visually. I find this feature particularly useful for moths, as although I've photographed several, I lack sufficient expertise and familiarity.

I've used the iNaturalist taxonomy under Moths and Butterflies for moths to create a table of superfamilies to visually browse. The site limits display to the top 500 most frequently observed species within a given search, hence for some superfamilies (SF) such as Noctuoidea, the individual families (F) need to be perused in order to see all of the species identified to date.

Other tools exist, however these tend to display pinned moth specimens, whereas the images on iNaturalist tend to be photographs of live moths with their wings folded. Comparing between your photo of a live moth and pinned specimens can be difficult, hence why there's a benefit to looking at the species list on iNaturalist.

Perhaps this will also be useful to others.

Visual Tools for Lepidoptera Identification

These are other tools that I use regularly:

North American Moth Photographers Group: Plate index of North American moth species.

Pacific Northwest Moths: Photographic Plates. Coverage is limited to the following moth families:

  • S.F. Bombycoidea (only native families: Saturniidae, Sphingidae)
  • S.F. Drepanoidea (only native family: Drepanidae)
  • S.F. Geometroidea (only: Uraniidae) ... not: Geometridae (!)
  • S.F. Lasiocampoidea (Lasiocampidae)
  • S.F. Noctuoidea (Notodontidae, Erebidae, Euteliidae, Nolidae, and Noctuidae)

Lists of BC Moth Species Observed on iNaturalist

Num Species Level Name Taxon num Nickname Visual List (.ca) Visual List (.org)
556 SF Noctuoidea 47607 Owlet Moths and Allies link link
↳6 ↳F Nolidae 52873 Tufted Moths link link
↳420 ↳F Noctuidae 48670 Cutworm Moths and Allies link link
↳29 ↳F Notodontidae 47718 Prominent Moths link link
↳100 ↳F Erebidae 121850 Underwing, Tiger, Tussock, and Allied Moths link link
↳1 ↳F Euteliidae 122126 Euteliid Moths link link
↳0 ↳F Oenosandridae 208620 Oenosandrid Moths link link
258 SF Geometroidea 49531 Geometrid and Swallowtail Moths link link
171 SF Papilionoidea 47224 Butterflies link link
132 SF Tortricoidea 47156 Tortricid Leafroller Moths and Allies link link
131 SF Pyraloidea 49682 Pyralid and Crambid Snout Moths link link
64 SF Gelechioidea 55518 Curved-horn Moths link link
28 SF Bombycoide 47214 Hawk, Sphinx, Silk, Emperor, and Allied Moths link link
24 SF Yponomeutoidea 53552 Ermine Moths and Allies link link
22 SF Cossoidea 122746 Carpenter, Leopard, Goat, and Allied Moths link link
18 SF Tineoidea 61414 Bagworms, Clothes Moths, and Allies link link
14 SF Pterophoroidea 47405 (Plume Moths) link link
13 SF Gracillarioidea 61352 - link link
9 SF Adeloidea 51269 link link
9 SF Drepanoidea 84429 Hooktip Moths and Allies link link
8 SF Choreutoidea 67431 - link link
7 SF Lasiocampoidea 56583 - link link
5 SF Hepialoidea 53784 Ghost Moths and Swift Moths link link
3 SF Copromorphoidea 173392 Fruitworm Moths link link
2 SF Nepticuloidea 176535 Pygmy Leafminer Moths link link
2 SF Tischerioidea 244425 Trumpet Leafminer Moths link link
1 SF Alucitoidea 48149 Many-plumed and False Plume Moths link link
1 SF Eriocranioidea 173581 - link link
1 SF Micropterigoidea 173647 Mandibulate Archaic Moth link link
1 SF Schreckensteinioidea 345533 - link link
1 SF Thyridoidea 82789 Picture-winged Leaf Moths link link
1 SF Zygaenoidea 52029 Flannel, Slug Caterpillar, Leaf Skeletonizer, and Allied Moths link link
0 SF Acanthopteroctetoidea 453155 link link
0 SF Agathiphagoidea 479873 link link
0 SF Andesianoidea 874769 - link link
0 SF Calliduloidea 121882 - link link
0 SF Epermenioidea 173636 Fringe-tufted Moths link link
0 SF Galacticoidea 417180 Galacticid Moths link link
0 SF Heterobathmioidea 625199 - link link
0 SF Hyblaeoidea 202663 Teak Moths link link
0 SF Immoidea 52009 - link link
0 SF Lophocoronoidea 752426 - link link
0 SF Mimallonoidea 119526 Sack-bearer Moths link link
0 SF Mnesarchaeoidea 479874 - link link
0 SF Neopseustoidea 736085 - link link
0 SF Palaephatoidea 526833 - link link
0 SF Simaethistoidea 752423 - link link
0 SF Urodoidea 417188 False Burnet Moths link link
0 SF Whalleyanoidea 752419 - link link
0 F Aenigmatineidae 1008068 - link link
0 F Douglasiidae 178892 - link link
0 F Millieriidae 981683 - link link

How was this made?

The above list is just a table. Journals use Markdown formatting, and there is also Markdown formatting for creating tables.

The easiest way to make a Markdown table is to first create the table in a spreadsheet (mine was in Google Docs), then to copy the table and paste it into the Markdown Tables Generator. That site will quickly convert the table into Markdown code. Copy and paste the code into the journal and voilà, you're done.

To make the links, I used a CONCATENATE function, which is commonly found in spreadsheet applications, to place the taxon_id number in each link. Here's an example formula:

=concatenate("[link](https://www.inaturalist.ca/observations?place_id=7085&taxon_id=",D2,"&view=species)")

If you wish to replicate this for yourself,

Posted on September 5, 2021 12:51 AM by murphyslab murphyslab

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