Agathiphaga is a genus of insects in the order Lepidoptera. This caddis fly-like lineage of primitive "Kauri moths" was first reported by Lionel Jack Dumbleton in 1952, as a new genus of Micropterigidae. He described two species, one occurring in Queensland, Eastern Australia[1] and the other distributed from Fiji to Vanuatu and Solomon Islands. The caterpillars feed only on Agathis (Araucariaceae) and are currently considered the second most primitive living lineage of moths after Micropterigoidea (Kristensen, 1999: 41-44). Remarkably, the larva has been reported to be able to survive for 12 years in diapause (Upton, 1997), durability possibly a prerequisite to its possible dispersion around the Pacific islands in the seeds of Agathis.
References
Dumbleton, L.F. (1952). A new genus of seed-infesting micropterygid moths. Pacific Science, 6: 17-29.
Kristensen, N.P. (1999). The non-Glossatan Moths. Ch. 4, pp. 41-49 in Kristensen, N.P. (Ed.). Lepidoptera, Moths and Butterflies. Volume 1: Evolution, Systematics, and Biogeography. Handbuch der Zoologie. Eine Naturgeschichte der Stämme des Tierreiches / Handbook of Zoology. A Natural History of the phyla of the Animal Kingdom. Band / Volume IV Arthropoda: Insecta Teilband / Part 35: 491 pp. Walter de Gruyter, Berlin, New York.
Upton, M.S. (1997). A twelve-year larval diapause in the Queensland kauri moth, Agathiphaga queenslandiae Dumbleton (Lepidoptera: Agathiphagidae). The Entomologist, 116: 142-143.
