Colias fieldii

Colias fieldii , the dark clouded yellow, is a butterfly in the family Pieridae. It is found in southern Iran, India, southern China, Indochina, and Ussuri.[1][2]

Colias fieldii
from Arunachal Pradesh
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Arthropoda
Class: Insecta
Order: Lepidoptera
Family: Pieridae
Genus: Colias
Species:
C. fieldii
Binomial name
Colias fieldii

Biology

The larvae feed on Leguminosae species.

Subspecies

  • C. f. fieldii Yunnan, India
  • C. f. chinensis Verity, 1909 S.Ussuri

Taxonomy

Accepted as a species by Josef Grieshuber & Gerardo Lamas [3]

Description

Charles Thomas Bingham (1907) gives a detailed description:

Race fieldi, Ménétriés

♂.Upperside deep cadmium orange-yellow.Fore wing : a patch of greenish-black scales at extreme base, a pear-shaped black spot on the discocellulars and a broad terminal black border ; the last occupies about a fourth of the wing and has its inner margin curved slightly and irregularly crenulate, broader at apex and the tornus than in the middle ; the end portions of veins 6, 7, 9 and 10 subterminally pale and conspicuous on the black of the apex. Hind wing : a thin covering of long soft hairs at base,beneath which is a dusting of black scales that is continued outwards along the posterior half of the wing ; dorsum broadly pale yellow; terminal border broadly black, broadest in the middle,its inner margin crenulate ; discocellular spot large, consisting of a small patch on which the ground-colour is paler and brighter and that encloses two somewhat obscure dusky rings, the upper one minute. Cilia of both fore and hind wings broadly salmon-pink. Underside : light orange-yellow, the costal margin narrowly,terminal fourth of the fore wing and the whole surface of the hind wing overlaid with pale dull green ; the costa, termen and dorsum, with the cilia of both fore and hind wings, salmon-pink.Fore wing : discocellular spot as on the upperside but centred with silvery white ; a postdiscal transverse Aeries of black spots,obsolescent and curved inwards anteriorly, conspicuous and increasing in size posteriorly. Hind wing : a discocellular double spot conspicuous silvery and circled by a diffuse salmon-pink ring, followed by a very obscure, almost obsolete, transverse, post-discal series of pinkish spots. Antennae, head and thorax anteriorly salmon-pink, club of antennae darkening to brown ;thorax and abdomen dusky greenish black ; beneath : palpi, thorax and abdomen yellow. Sex-mark, a patch of thickly set light yellow scales at base of interspace 7 on the upperside of the hind wing. ♀ . Differs from the ♂ as follows : ♀ Upperside: the irroration of black scales at the base of the wings more extensive, especially on the hind wing ; the black on the subterminal margins broader, its inner edge on both fore and hind wings more irregular and somewhat diffuse ; on the fore wing the black is transversely traversed by a series of bright yellow spots, the anterior four small, obliquely placed, the posterior one large; on the hind wing the discocellular patch is without the central dark rings con-spicuous in the ♂ , and there is an obscure postdiscal curved transverse series of yellow spots bordering the black on the terminal margin. Underside : precisely similar to that of the ♂ .Antennae, head, thorax and abdomen on the upperside iis in the ♂ ; beneath : the palpi and thorax more or less salmon-pink.

Exp. ♂,♀ 50-64 mm. (1.98-2.5").

Hab. The Himalayas from Chitral to Sikhim and Bhutan, from 2500 to 14,000 feet; extending to Assam, Upper Burma and

China.

References

  1. Colias, Site of Markku Savela
  2. R.K., Varshney; Smetacek, Peter (2015). A Synoptic Catalogue of the Butterflies of India. New Delhi: Butterfly Research Centre, Bhimtal & Indinov Publishing, New Delhi. p. 23. doi:10.13140/RG.2.1.3966.2164. ISBN 978-81-929826-4-9.
  3. Josef Grieshuber & Gerardo Lamas (2007). "A synonymic list of the genus Colias Fabricius, 1807 (Lepidoptera: Pieridae)" (PDF). Mitteilungen der Münchner Entomologischen Gesellschaft. 97: 131–171. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2016-03-04. Retrieved 2013-05-16.
  4. One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a work now in the public domain: Bingham, Charles Thomas (1907). Fauna of British India. Butterflies Vol. 2. pp. 243–244.


This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.