New species and subspecies.
It’s been a long time since I updated this website, largely because the COVID-19 lockdowns prevented me from getting out at all during the autumn. Things are a lot less restricted now in NSW, but it’s winter so there isn’t much on the wing.
Whilst I haven’t been out butterflying, I have been able to add one new species and two subspecies to my tally. I spent some time looking through my unused photos and found I could add the following :
New species : Arrhenes marnas (Swamp Darter)
I’ve sometimes wondered how I’ve found Arrhenes dschilus (Scrub Darter) many times on my visits to Cairns, but hadn’t ever seen its close relative marnas. Admittedly marnas is less widespread, but given the amount of time I’d spent in the Cairns Central Swamp I thought I should have come across it at some point.
During the lockdown I got a call from Ross McLaren, who told me he’d been seeing marnas in the Central Swamp. That prompted me to look through my old Cairns photos and I found that I’d photographed that species in the Swamp on two different occasions. Of course now I want to go and get lots more – and much better – photos of this species…
New subspecies : Toxidia rietmanni parasema (White-brand Skipper)
On my most recent trip to Cairns in February 2020, Nils Beaven and I spent a couple of hours at Atherton, mostly waiting for the rain to stop so we could get out of the car and look for some butterflies. During one of the brief rain-free interludes Nils photographed a skipper that I couldn’t identify initially, though a look at Geoff Walker’s Australian Butterflies Photographed website showed it to be a female Toxidia rietmanni parasema. I then went and searched the area where Nils had seen her, though within a few minutes the rain returned with a vengeance so I wasn’t successful. When looking back through my shots from 2 years earlier I found one of parasema, photographed within 2 metres of the spot where Nils saw his. Unfortunately my butterfly’s wings were tightly shut 🙁 I need lots more shots!
New subspecies : Tisiphone abeona aurelia (Sword-grass Brown)
This is another one that I found after talking with Ross. We were discussing the Acrodipsas cuprea (Copper Ant-blues) I’d photographed at Shoal Bay, when Ross mentioned that the Swordgrass Browns there would belong to ssp. aurelia. It just so happened that I’d seen a couple of them on my most recent visit to that site. I hadn’t paid them much attention, as I’ve mostly found Swordgrass Browns to be contrary buggers who like to dance around for hours without settling, or if they do settle they enjoy taking off before I can get close enough for a photo. I did take a couple of dodgy shots of a courting / mating pair, but of course I now wish I’d taken the trouble to get better photos. I will try again on my next visit.
Links page
I have added a new website to my Links page. If you haven’t yet visited Pam’s Butterflies then I recommend that you go and have a browse when you’ve got some time. Pam’s site is packed with gorgeous photos of butterflies from many different countries. I found the site easy to navigate, which is quite an accomplishment in website design given the number of pages involved. When you drill down to species level each species’ page has a map showing where Pam has found this butterfly. I think it’s a wonderful website!
Taxonomic changes
A recent paper has reviewed the taxonomy of the Candalidini tribe of the Lycaenidae family. The paper’s lead author is Michael Braby and since there are 7 other co-authors the convention is to refer to them as Braby et al, though personally I’m going to call them…
The reclassifications are as follows :
- Candalides helenita (Shining Pencil-blue) is now Eirmocides helenita
- Candalides margarita (Trident Pencil-blue) is now Eirmocides margarita
- Candalides absimilis (Pencilled Blue) is now Eirmocides absimilis
- Candalides consimilis (Dark Pencilled Blue) is now Eirmocides consimilis
- Candalides cyprotus (Copper Pencil-blue) is now Cyprotides cyprotus
- Candalides hyacinthinus (Varied Dusky-blue) is now Erina hyacinthina
- Candalides hyacinthinus gilesi has been elevated to a species in its own right under the name of Erina gilesi, and will no doubt be expecting a pay rise commensurate with this promotion.
- Candalides geminus (Twin Dusky-blue) is now Erina geminus
- Candalides erinus (Small Dusky-blue) is now Erina erina
- Candalides acasta (Blotched Dusky-blue) is now Erina acasta
- Candalides delospila (Spotted Dusky-blue) is now Erina delospila
- Nesolycaena albosericea (Satin Opal) is now Candalides albosericea
- Nesolycaena medicea (Dark Opal) is now Candalides medicea
- Nesolycaena urumelia (Spotted Opal) is now Candalides urumelia
- Nesolycaena caesia (Kimberley Spotted Opal) is now Candalides caesia
You can get a copy of the paper here : Molecular phylogeny of the tribe Candalidini (Lepidoptera: Lycaenidae): systematics, diversification and evolutionary history
Swamp darters can be commonly found in the canals at Catanna Wetlands Smithfield Cairns, particularly behind right side lake end of wet season. It was all I was able to find on one occasion !