The genus Locheutis Meyrick (Lepidoptera: Oecophoridae) from the Palaearctic and Oriental regions, with descriptions of four new species

Meyrick (1883) established the genus Locheutis, with L. philochora Meyrick, 1883 from Tasmania as its type species. To date, Locheutis includes 18 described species worldwide. Among them, 11 species are known from Australia and three from New Zealand (Gaede 1938; Nielsen 1996); four species were described in the Palearctic and Oriental regions: Meyrick (1914) described L. empolaea from Sri Lanka, Wang (2002, 2004) described L. tianmushana Wang, 2002 and L. jiangkouensis Wang, 2004 from China, and Wang (2004) transferred Cryptolechia iridias Meyrick, 1910 described from India to Locheutis. Locheutis is poorly studied and its taxonomic status may need to be further studied using molecular methods. We tentatively keep Locheutis in the family Oecophoridae in this study. The objectives of this paper are to describe four new species based on the specimens collected in China and Thailand, to redescribe two previously known Chinese species, and to provide a key to all the eight species occur Four new species of the genus Locheutis Meyrick, 1883 are described. Locheutis pingxiangensis Wang, sp. nov., L. similempolaea Wang, sp. nov. and L. spinellosa Wang, sp. nov. are described from China; L. elliptica Wang, sp. nov. is described from Thailand. Locheutis jiangkouensis Wang, 2004 and L. tianmushana Wang, 2002 are redescribed, with the female of L. tianmushana described for the first time. Images of adults and available genitalia are provided as well as a key to the species based on male genitalia.