Galapagos Species Database
The Galapagos Species Database shares the information about the species from our Natural History Collections.
Cocytius antaeus
Giant sphinx
Farmers in Santa Cruz and San Cristobal islands have reported the presence of "voracious green hornworms" feeding on leaves and branches of the introduced custard apple (Annona cherimola). These reports likely refer to C. antaeus, because no other Galapagos sphingids feed on members of the Annonaceae family ( Roque-Albelo, 1999).
Domain
Eukaryota
Kingdom
Animalia
Phylum
Arthropoda
Class
Insecta
Order
Lepidoptera
Superfamily
Bombycoidea
Family
Sphingidae
Genus
Cocytius
Species
antaeus
Taxon category: Accepted
Origin: Native
Map of specimen collection localities or observation records for this species in our collections database.
Distribution: Santa Cruz
- Roque-Albelo, L. Landry, B. (2016) CDF Checklist of Galapagos Butterflies and Moths Charles Darwin Research Station, Puerto Ayora, Ecuador, 32 pp.
- Roque-Albelo, L. (1999) Two large tropical moths (Thysania zenobia (Noctuidae) and Cocutius antaeus (Sphingidae) colonize the Galapagos Islands. Journal of the Lepidopterists Society 53(3): 129-130.
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This page should be cited as follows:
"Galapagos Species Database, Cocytius antaeus", dataZone. Charles Darwin Foundation, https://datazone.darwinfoundation.org/en/checklist/?species=7125. Accessed 11 May 2025.