Hi Justin

Looking at these again closely I realise a couple of mis-ID's crept in.

These Colotis are absolute little swines to ID sometimes. Plus, it's often impossible to pin them down to one 'form' because there are so many intermediates between what are essentially seasonal extremes. Collectors like to categorise and name things and this led to a vast number of (mainly spurious IMHO) infrasubspecific names. So don't stress too much about naming forms of pierids - they have absolutely no taxonomic significance!

So to start...

Did (2) have black spots on the upper side? If it did, it's definitely a C.auxo. Looking at the dark 'L' marking on the underside hindwing, now I think it looks like a Colotis antevippe gavisa probably nr f.zera.

Spialia are very difficult to ID from upper sides - I called the S.d.ferax in (9) because of the very regular look to the HW discal white band, which tends to follow the shape of the underside banding. This insect also tends to have a very regular (i.e., the spots are evenly spaced with no strong banding) look to the upper side forewing spotting. And the S.spio in (12) has the white basal spot on the forewing upper side costa (wing leading edge). This can be variable and this butterfly is sometimes very hard to tell apart from S.mafa, which tends to have a pale stripe on the costa not a discrete spot. Again you really need the underside to be absolutely certain!

(13) is definitely not Colotis ione - it's a female Colotis danae annae, the discrete, dark edged nature of the hindwing underside band of spots points it out.

Cheers

Steve

Hi Steve,

Thanks for spotting the mistakes, I saw these guys so long ago unfortunately I cant remember the upper wing patterns of many. As I go along, I will start learning what it is that I have to look out for. Like the under wing pattern of the Sandmen for instance.

Thanks for the more detailed explination of the Spialia, it makes much more sense and I can see the differnces in the two as pointed out, now just have to wait to try get some underwing shots which I find hard with these guys.

Not too sure if you missed my post regarding the leptotes on this thread?! Maybe you could commetn on the IDing of the species under the microscope.

Thanks,

Justin

Rusty Justy wrote:
Further more, regarding the Leptotes,

is there no way to seperate these in the field what so ever?! For instance, larval form, food sources, behaviour (if butterflies can behave any differently to each other, as I often use this to ID birds )

If the answer is no....and the genitals are what I should be playing with What magnification would I require?! As Im sure I could use the Universities Ento Departments scopes....also, where would I get the info depicting what the differences are in the genitals between these Common Blues?! As I have no Idea what to look for.......



Justin

Hi Justin

I used to have some drawings of the genitalia - I'll see if I can find them. Or you can ask Graham Henning - he is very good with genitalia.

We suspect there may be differences in host plants and early stages but we need to be able to reliably find wild populations of the butterflies so we can tie them to these. And to make it more complicated I have found them laying eggs that looked different, on other plants than Plumbago, and Graham ID'd them all as L.pirithous from the genitalia!

We still have a lot to learn about this genus.

Cheers

Steve

Hi Steve,

If you do ever come across those drawings, if its not to much of a mission perhaps you could e-mail them to me when ever you get the time in the future?! (Alternatively, I did meet Mark Kirk, while bird ringing in Ruimsig. He mentioned that when I'm back in Jhb, we could try organise some outing together to do some lepidoptery, possibly with yourself included, so I could always speak to you in person about it then.)

It's this lack of understading that intrigues me, I find it amazing how complicated such a small insects life cycle can be. Hopefully in the future you might have a break through.

Where would I be able to get Grahams details from?!

Justin

Graham's e-mail address is safshenn@mweb.co.za, and telehone no's 011 434 1345 (work), 011 768 1949 (home).

I live in Durban, but will be in JHB for the conference on 24-26 September and will have one day in the field on 23rd. Maybe we can meet then!

Cheers

Steve

Thanks again! I will keep those dates in mind!