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Stichophthalma sparta

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Species of butterfly

Stichophthalma sparta
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Arthropoda
Class: Insecta
Order: Lepidoptera
Family: Nymphalidae
Genus: Stichophthalma
Species: S. sparta
Binomial name
Stichophthalma sparta
de Nicéville, 1889

Stichophthalma sparta, the Manipur jungle queen, is a butterfly found in South Asia that belongs to the Morphinae subfamily of the brush-footed butterflies family.

Distribution

The Manipur jungle queen ranges from Assam (Abor Hills), Nagaland, Manipur across Myanmar (Kindat and Katha in the north; Htawgaw and Sadon in the north-east of the country, and Gokteik in the northern Shan states) onto northern Yunnan in China.

Status

Evans reports the butterfly as not rare in Sikkim and Assam and as very rare in the Naga Hills. Haribal reports the butterfly as rare in Sikkim.

Description

For a key to the terms used, see Glossary of entomology terms.

Upperside of both males and females ochraceous yellow suffused with a darker, somewhat brownish shade of the same towards base of forewing and on hindwing. Forewing has a postdiscal transverse row of fleur-de-lys-shaped spots, a subterminal series of broad black lunules, followed by a series of narrow crescentic marks of the ochraceous ground colour; apex and a terminal line black. Hindwing has a subterminal series of black lunules as on the forewing, giving out inwards a series of large, shafted, roundly lanceolate marks of the same colour, followed, as on the forewing, by narrow ochraceous crescentic marks and a terminal black line, the marks posteriorly rather diffuse and tending to run together. Underside ochraceous yellow, with the following transverse markings: subbasal, median, postdiscal, sub terminal and terminal dark brown sinuous lines; a discal row of dark ochraceous ocelli, six on forewing, five on hindwing: and, bordering the ocelli on the inner side, a variable diffuse dusky-black band, ending posteriorly on the hindwing in a black tornal spot. Antennae dark brown; head, thorax and abdomen ochraceous, abdomen paler beneath.

Female upperside is similar, the black markings broader and heavier. Underside also similar, but the ground colour a beautiful pale green with a silky lustre, the median transverse dark brown line outwardly bordered from costa of forewing to vein 1 of hindwing with greenish white; the dusky-black transversely discal band broader and more diffuse: forewing with seven ocelli; terminal margins broadly but lightly infuscated.

See also

Cited references

  1. ^ "Stichophthalma C. & R. Felder, 1862" at Markku Savela's Lepidoptera and Some Other Life Forms
  2. ^ Evans, W.H. (1932). The Identification of Indian Butterflies (2nd ed.). Mumbai, India: Bombay Natural History Society. pp. 132–133.
  3. Haribal, Meena (1992). The Butterflies of Sikkim Himalaya and Their Natural History. Gangtok, Sikkim, India: Sikkim Nature Conservation Foundation.
  4. Bingham, C.T. (1905). The Fauna of British India, Including Ceylon and Burma Butterflies. Vol. 1 (1st ed.). London: Taylor and Francis, Ltd. (under Stichophthalma howqua)

References

Taxon identifiers
Stichophthalma sparta
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