Tecmessa (moth)

Tecmessa is a Neotropical genus of moths of the family Notodontidae described by Hermann Burmeister in 1878, and historically confused with the Old World genus Cerura.^[1]

Tecmessa
Tecmessa gonema, Guyana
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Arthropoda
Class:	Insecta
Order:	Lepidoptera
Superfamily:	Noctuoidea
Family:	Notodontidae
Subfamily:	Heterocampinae
Genus:	Tecmessa Burmeister, 1878

Tecmessa recently contained more than 20 species. As a result of research published in 2023, 17 of the species were transferred to the new genus Americerura. In the same publication, the genus Tecmessa was moved from subfamily Cerurinae to Heterocampinae.^[2]

Species

These seven species belong to the genus Tecmessa:^[2]

• Tecmessa annulipes (Berg, 1878)
• Tecmessa elegans (Schaus, 1901)
• Tecmessa gonema (Schaus, 1905)
• Tecmessa laqueata (Schaus, 1911)
• Tecmessa olindata (Schaus, 1939)
• Tecmessa pedrana (Schaus, 1939)
• Tecmessa pica (Butler, 1882)