Acacia heterophylla 1.4 million years ago. "A. heterophylla" sequences nest within those of the more diverse "A. koa", making the latter species paraphyletic. Both species are descended from an ancestral species in Australia, presumably their sister species, "Acacia melanoxylon"; the means of dispersal to Hawaii and then to Réunion (the latter trip a distance of 18,000 km) is thought to have been seed-carrying by birds such as petrels (the seeds of these species are not adapted for prolonged immersion in seawater). Both species also have very similar ecological niches, which differ from that of "A. melanoxylon". Acacia heterophylla Acacia heterophylla, the highland
Scotorythra paludicola State Park. Laboratory feeding trials of these larvae showed that they could complete their development at the same rate on both the normal host ("Acacia koa") and the invasive tree ("Falcataria moluccana"). Three other exotic tree species, "Acacia confusa", "Prosopis pallida", and "Leucaena leucocephala" were not suitable host plants and all the larvae tested on these species died after 5 days of feeding. Scotorythra paludicola Scotorythra paludicola, the koa looper moth, is a moth of the family Geometridae. It was first described by Arthur Gardiner Butler in 1879. It is endemic to the Hawaiian islands of Kauai, Oahu, Maui and