Chocolate Swamp Wainscot

Philpott described the adults of the species as follows:

♂ ♀. 38-40 mm. Head and palpi reddish-brown sprinkled with white. Antennae reddish-brown, basally white, in male with short cilla. Thorax with slight blunt anterior crest, greyish-white; a white frontal bar, margined beneath with blackish-brown and above with reddish-brown; patagia margined with reddish-brown. Abdomen in ♂ brown, in ♀ grey. Legs reddish-brown, tarsi mixed with white. Forewings narrow, costa almost straight, apex blunt-pointed, termen rounded, obhque; bright reddish-brown irroraled with whitish; basal area above middle for about 1⁄4 in ♂ clearer white, in ♀ less marked and extending farther along costa; a fine blackish median streak from base to 1⁄3, margined beneath with dark reddish-brown; a broad streak along dorsum suffused with whitish; first line strongly dentate, white, prosteriorly brown-margined, hardly traceable on upper half; an indistinct blackish line in disc above middle; second line hardly distinguishable, blackish-margined, strongly dentate, apex of teeth marked by black dots; subterminal very strongly and irregularly dentate, dentations filled with whitish, anteriorly interruptedly blackish-margined; stigmata almost obsolete, in female orbicular and reniform represented by obscure pinkish blotches : cilla reddish-brown, tips more or less whitish. …

It is endemic to New Zealand. This species is found only in certain parts of the North Island, in the western side of the South Island and on Stewart Island.

The life history of this species is unknown and the host species of its larvae has yet to be confirmed. It has been hypothesised that larval host species might be within the Empodisma genus as well as possibly Apodasmia similis.

== References ==