Tasmania is rich in Lepidoptera. The species are
numerous, very interesting, but have been very little studied.
There is a great want of resident collectors and observers
and it is to encourage these that this revision has been
planned. The classification adopted is that used in Dr.
Tillyard's recent book. It is a revision of species only; no
notice is taken of local races (usually, but unfortunately,
called subspecies). To each genus and species is added the
name of its author. Synonyms are excluded, and after
each species there is given a single reference, not necessarily
to the original description, but to the best available
description for the local student.
Where this description appears under another name, that
name is added in brackets. Genera and species which have
not been recorded outside Tasmania are distinguished by a
-*.
Tasmania
was united to the mainland during the lifetime of
existing species in Pleistocene times. A period of glaciation,
which occurred during this connection, covered the mountains
with snowfields, while the lower areas supported a fauna
which has since then been restricted to alpine regions. In
this way we explain the occurrence of a number of identical
species in the widely separated areas of Cradle Mountain
and the Australian Alps. Much of the old Tasmanian
fauna, not able to withstand these rigorous conditions, must
have been driven northwards, to return with the resumption
of a milder climate, probably with some impoverishment,
which was compensated by a large immigration of Australian
forms. The whole fauna is now preponderatingly
Australian, but a relatively small proportion of peculiarly
Tasmanian forms still survive, mostly in the mountains
