Corresponding author: P. R. Shashank (
Academic editor: Bong-Kyu Byun
There have been several recent checklists, books and publications about Indian moths; however, much of this work has focused on biodiversity hotspots such as North-east India, Western Ghats and Western Himalayas. There is a lack of published literature on urban centres in India, despite the increased need to monitor insects at sites with high levels of human disturbance. In this study, we examine the moths of Delhi, the national capital region of India, one of the fastest growing mega-metropolitan cities. We present a comprehensive checklist of 338 moths species using 8 years of light trapping data (2012-2020) and examining about 2000 specimens from historical collections at the National Pusa Collection of ICAR-Indian Agricultural Research Institute, New Delhi (NPC-IARI) spanning over 100 years (1907-2020). The checklist comprises moths from 32 families spanning 14 superfamilies with
This is the first comprehensive annotated checklist of the moths of Delhi. The present study adds 234 species to the biodiversity of moths from Delhi that were not reported previously, along with illustrations for 195 species.
In this study, we focus on the moth fauna of Delhi, the National capital territory of India, one of the largest growing metropolitan centres in the world with an estimated population of 23 million (
In general, the insect fauna of Delhi has received less attention with only very few groups like butterflies (
There are limited studies in India that have utilised moth collections preserved in museums and none that have integrated this with primary survey data and secondary data from literature and citizen science projects. In the present work, we have studied the moth collections at National Pusa Collection, Division of Entomology, ICAR-Indian Agricultural Research Institute, New Delhi (NPC-IARI) which is one of the four important
In the present study, the biodiversity of moths of the region was studied by an exhaustive exploration of the museum holdings of the National Pusa Collection, Department of Entomology at ICAR-Indian Agricultural Research Institute, Delhi (NPC-IARI) which is one of the largest insect repositories in Asia for agricultural pests since the 1900s. The specimens of moths belonging to Delhi were sorted separately for the present study. A database has been created from individual specimens, based on label data including the name of the collector, date of collection, method of collection, associated host plants and sex. This includes more than 1500 specimens since 1907 up to 2020 which can be accessed at
Field surveys were conducted from 2012 to 2020 by setting up light traps at different locations, viz. the Indian Agricultural Research Institute (ICAR- IARI), Pusa (
The available literature was used to identify the moths, including
Along with the above museum collection data and surveys, additionally, data from citizen science internet portals, such as the Moths of India (
Finally, a comprehensive checklist has been prepared by including all the data from museum specimens, field surveys, available literature and citizen science portals. The classification system used by
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The present study encompasses 338 moth species belonging to 32 different families pertaining to 14 superfamilies. Two hundred and thirty four species were added to the existing moth fauna of Delhi. Amongst the different superfamilies, the highest number of species were recorded in the superfamily
In most parts of the world, the nocturnal
The paucity of baseline data, both in terms of abundance and diversity of moths, poses a significant hurdle in assessing the impact of various threats like land-use changes, rapid urbanisation, pollution, insecticides and global warming (
In conclusion, we believe that there will still be many more species that can be added to the present list as moths are sampled more extensively and studied more intensively using modern techniques, such as DNA barcoding. However, our study helps to establish the first comprehensive preliminary dataset on moths of the region, which can be a spring-board for future well-planned moth recording in Delhi. The areas for future investigation include concentrating on developing comprehensive species inventory, studying larval host associations and evaluation and prioritising moth species for conservation.
We thank Dr. Ashok Kumar Singh, Director, ICAR-IARI; Dr. V.V. Ramamurthy, Ex-professor and Dr. Debjani Dey, Head (Acting), Division of Entomology and the administration of ICAR-IARI for their continued support during the present study. This study was funded under DST-SERB Core Research Grant (No. CRG/2018/000753) to the corresponding author. This work is also a part of the Master’s thesis of the first author to be submitted to the ICAR-Indian Agricultural Research Institute (IARI), New Delhi. The first author acknowledges the the support of Indian Council of Agricultural Research, New Delhi by providing a Junior Research Fellowship and also NAHEP, Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR), New Delhi, Grant No. NAHEP/CAAST/2018-19/07. We also thank Dr. Gautam Talukdar, Scientist E and Mr. Dinesh Singh Pundir, Web Information Manager from Wildlife Institute of India, Dehradun, Uttarakhand, India for helping us in GBIF data submission.
JK, SPR, SS, SM: Conducted fieldwork, compiled data, inspected specimens, manuscript writing. SPR: Conceived the project. NMM, YS and AS: Compiled data, verified records, assisted in writing the manuscript. SPR: Supervision. SPR and NMM: Funding acquisition.
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Number of species under different superfamilies and families in Delhi.
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24 |
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2 |
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2 | ||
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20 | ||
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1 |
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1 |
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15 |
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1 |
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1 | ||
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2 | ||
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3 | ||
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5 | ||
|
1 | ||
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1 | ||
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1 | ||
|
37 |
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36 |
|
1 | ||
|
5 |
|
5 |
|
7 |
|
7 |
|
1 |
|
1 |
|
164 |
|
95 |
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1 | ||
|
54 | ||
|
14 | ||
|
3 |
|
3 |
|
69 |
|
57 |
|
12 | ||
|
4 |
|
4 |
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1 |
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1 |
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3 |
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1 |
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1 | ||
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1 | ||
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4 |
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1 |
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2 | ||
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1 |