Pterophorus melanopoda is a moth

Moth

A moth is an insect closely related to the butterfly, both being of the order Lepidoptera. Moths form the majority of this order; there are thought to be 150,000 to 250,000 different species of moth , with thousands of species yet to be described...

 of the Pterophoridae family. It is found in India

India

India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...

 and Sri Lanka

Sri Lanka

Sri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka is a country off the southern coast of the Indian subcontinent. Known until 1972 as Ceylon , Sri Lanka is an island surrounded by the Indian Ocean, the Gulf of Mannar and the Palk Strait, and lies in the vicinity of India and the...

.

The wingspan

Wingspan

The wingspan of an airplane or a bird, is the distance from one wingtip to the other wingtip. For example, the Boeing 777 has a wingspan of about ; and a Wandering Albatross caught in 1965 had a wingspan of , the official record for a living bird.The term wingspan, more technically extent, is...

is about 28 mm. The head, antennae, palpi, thorax and abdomen are pale glistening white. The forewings are pure glistening white, sprinkled with very minute black scales The hindwings are also pure glistening white, with a patch of faint fuscous on the costa of the first segment at three-quarters, and also on the inner margin of the second segment at three-quarters and at one-half. On the second segment, there is a moderate patch of black scales at one-half, and small black dots at three-quarters and at the apex.