Cephonodes sanshaensis Deng & Huang, 2024

Male wingspan: 48-50mm. Head covered with green hairs; compound eyes brown, with white hairs around the eyes; antennae clubbed, brown, apically hooked. Face white, proboscis brown. Thoracic tergites green. Foretibia with an apical claw. Forewing upperside with marginal band 2-2.5mm broad at Rs₄, inner edge even between the veins. Upperside of abdomen green with a black and dark red belt; tergite VI with a black median patch, usually mixed with some red scales; the above colour pattern forms a funnel-shaped stripe. Underside of abdomen white, an oblique black and dark red band on each side of sternites I-IV extended to the end and connected in the centre. Upper side of anal tuft yellow-green with black hairs laterally, but underside black with white hairs centrally.

Male genitalia: Uncus quite asymmetrical, slightly tapering to apex, divided into two lobes by a medial groove, left lobe a little longer than right, rectangular, each side parallel, apex with two small spines; right lobe strongly developed, forming a long, acute pointed hook. Gnathos without processes, represented by a low ridge. Valves asymmetrical, left valva long and narrow, each side almost parallel, with a truncate apex; right valva broad knife-shaped, costa straight with an arcuate ventral margin, cucullus blunt; juxta conical. Phallus slender, caudal 2/3 well sclerotized and tapering.

Female genitalia: Papillae anales small, suborbicular, beset with scattered scales. Apophyses posteriores large, rod-like, with a rounded apex, and much longer than the apophyses anteriores, which has a somewhat club-shaped apex. Ductus bursae large, gradually broadening. Corpus bursae small, bag-like, signum absent.

Cephonodes sanshaensis differs from Cephonodes hylas in having an apical claw on the foretibia; Cephonodes hylas lacks a pronounced apical claw. Cephonodes sanshaensis is similar to Cephonodes kingii, but is immediately distinguishable by a smaller forewing apical patch. Among the known species of Cephonodes, this new species is visually most similar to Cephonodes picus but can be distinguished by the following characters: right uncus lobe hook-shaped with a distinctly acute apex (in Cephonodes picus it is slender and rod-like); left valve is long and narrow with a truncate apex, whereas in Cephonodes picus it is broad and somewhat dilated apically; costa of right valve is straight, but in Cephonodes picus it is slightly concave; and papillae anales small and suborbicular, whereas in Cephonodes picus they have sharp tips (Deng et al., 2024; STI 23183).

Deng et al. (2024) (STI 23183) also stated that DNA barcode data place Cephonodes sanshaensis closest to Cephonodes xanthus, with a genetic divergence of 2.4%. However, unbeknownst to them, the holotype of Cephonodes sanshaensis falls into BIN: BOLD ACE8425, which also includes a sample from SW India and one from the Maldive Islands. With a genetic divergence of 1.39%, this BIN is actually closest to BIN: BOLD ABZ7280, which contains three samples from SW India currently identified as Cephonodes picus. Unfortunately, none of the samples from this latter BIN was included in the Deng et al. study.