Ephestia elutella
species of moth
Ephestia elutella, the cacao moth, tobacco moth or warehouse moth, is a small moth of the family Pyralidae. It is probably native to Europe, but has been transported widely, even to Australia. A subspecies is E. e. pterogrisella.
Description
The wingspan is 14–20 mm. Forewings in male are less elongate, [ than other Ephestia ] with costal fold enclosing flocculent scales; grey, sprinkled with whitish and mixed with dark fuscous, towards dorsum often also with ferruginous-reddish; lines pale, dark-edged, first straight, rather oblique, second almost straight; two darker transversely placed discal dots. Hindwings pale fuscous, anteriorly thinly scaled, in 6 with median and subdorsal whitish-ochreous basal hair tufts. Larva brown-whitish; dots brown; head and plate of 2 reddish brown: on biscuit, chocolate, figs
This moth flies throughout the warmer months, e.g. from the end of April to October in Belgium and the Netherlands.
Infestation
The caterpillars of Ephestia elutella are often considered a pest, as they feed on dry plant produce, such as cocoa beans and tobacco, as well as cereals and dried fruit and nuts.
“Ephestia elutella” enters the record as species of moth. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Ephestia, elutella and species can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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“Ephestia elutella” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Ephestia, elutella and species provides the most credible route into that argument.
The date and method of observation matter as much as the stated conclusion, especially where classification or consensus has changed. The source revision retrieved here is dated May 19, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q928458. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference.
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This entry incorporates text from “Ephestia elutella” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.