Species ID

The following is a list of described species and their synonyms*

This list is taken from the incredible 'Checklist of the Lepidoptera of Australia', compiled and edited by Nielsen, Edwards and Rangsi at the CSIRO in 1996. 

Click on the bold names to see updated identification info and images of the species (when I've got them).

*See below for some explanations of taxonomy!

*A note on nomenclature and taxonomy

What in the world is a synonym?? Back in ye olde days when the internet was not even a twinkle in its developer's eye, old mate taxonomists probably thought they were the first (white) person to ever lay a scientific eye on an organism. A lot of Australian species would be gathered up, stuck in a matchbox, or whatever was handy and shipped over to Europe to whomever was in the taxonomy biz at the time - and shipping would take months. So Old Mate received these dead specimens, probably a bit mouldy and broken, and went through the arduous task of describing it (That's Old Mate's name in the brackets, with the date the description was published). The description would be typed up, sent to a scientific journal or newsletter, which would then be printed in a press and then posted to whomever had a membership, and to museums and universities, I guess. 

Anyway, by the time the description was published, there was undoubtedly other taxonomists who had just gone through the same process with the exact same species and had named it a completely different name and they had no idea because no one had Insta or FB or a phone probably to let every one know they'd named this thing already. So we end up with a 'Synonym' - Something that's been named more than once - and someone at some point went through and decided that *this* is actually the name that we'll all use from now on, but we still recognise that someone else also went to the effort of naming it at some point.

Also, I'll just add here that Meyrick in 1886 named a whole bunch of Amata specimens (He was probably getting paid by the description and pumped them all out as fast as he could so he could pay his rent) and you'll notice that it looks like he named a bunch of synonyms. This is the trouble with Amata. They have slight variations in their wing spot number and size and colour, and can look quite different close up, even though they might be the same species. He probably had no idea how close or far away the collection sites were for each specimen he saw and decided they were different species. Also, the specimen had just travelled halfway around the world and lost its antennae or wing or something and he just did the best he could. 

Anyway, it's my problem now, thanks everybody.