Catopsilia pyranthe

Catopsilia pyranthe
Mottled Emigrant from South India
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Arthropoda
Class:	Insecta
Order:	Lepidoptera
Family:	Pieridae
Genus:	Catopsilia
Species:	C. pyranthe
Binomial name
Catopsilia pyranthe (Linnaeus, 1758)

The Mottled Emigrant, Catopsilia pyranthe, is a medium sized butterfly of the Family Pieridae found in South Asia, Southeast Asia and parts of Australia.

Description

Male

Male in Hyderabad, India

The upperside is chalky-white, slightly tinted in some specimens with green. The fore wing is with or without a discocellular black spot, that varies in size; costa and termen sometimes without a black margin; occasionally the costa has its apical third narrowly black, broadened slightly at the apex with black spots between the anterior veins; or again, the costa may be narrowly black, the apex very broadly so, and this colour continued down the termen but narrowed posteriorly. The hind wing is sometimes immaculate, but generally with narrow terminal black spots at the apices of the veins, these often reduced to mere dots, or again so broadened as to coalesce into a narrow terminal black margin.

The underside's ground-color is similar, suffused on the anterior half of the fore and over the whole surface of the hind wing with a greenish tint that varies to an ochraceous yellow, and, except in the very palest specimens, is evenly irrorated over the greenish or ochraceous-tinted areas with transverse, short, reddish-brown strigae; both fore and hind wings with generally an obscure discocellular reddish-brown spot or indication thereof.

Mating in Hyderabad, India

Female

Female at Kolkata, India.

The upperside is as in the male, but sometimes with a suffusion of pale greenish yellow on the terminal third or fourth only of both fore and hind wings, rarely of that tint throughout. The fore wing is always with a discocellular black spot that varies very much in size; costa sometimes narrowly black with the basal half pinkish, in other specimens narrowly black throughout, the black broadened at the apex and continued along the anterior half of the termen in a series of inwardly-pointed black spots; or again, the costa may be more broadly black, that colour widened considerably at the apex and continued broadly down the termen to vein 3, then suddenly narrowed to a slender line at the tornus. In most specimens there is an anterior postdiscal short black macular baud; in the dark forms this coalesce with the black on apex and termen. The hind wing is sometimes immaculate, sometimes with a series of terminal spots at the apices of the veins, sometimes with a narrow dusky-black terminal band broadest near the apex, narrowed posteriorly to a slender line at the tornus. In the very dark specimens there is in addition an ill-defined, short anterior postdiscal macular black band.

The underside is as in the male, with similar variations, but in addition in most specimens the discocellular spots are well-defined with an outer red ring that encircles a silvery spot; on the hind wing one or two similar spots on each side of the discocellulars; generally also both wings are crossed by a transverse postdiscal line of minute red spots, which on the fore wing is confined to the anterior portion, on the hind wing is nearly complete. In both sexes: antennae reddish, head and thorax anteriorly brown, thorax clothed posteriorly with long white hairs, abdomen white: beneath: the palpi, thorax and abdomen white.^[1]

Life history

Caterpillar

The host plants of the species include Cassia spp. (e.g. C. fistula; C. javanica^[2] or C. roxburghii;^[3] C. bakeriana), Gnidia glauca,^[4] Senna spp. (e.g. S. alata; S. auriculata; S. garrettiana), Crotalaria spp., Ormocarpum cochinchinense, Sesbania spp. and Colocasia.^[5]

Pupa

The development period from egg to adult is 22 to 29 days allowing up to 11-12 generations a year.^[6]

Larva: "Long, somewhat depressed, rough, green, with a white lateral line and above it a black line more or less conspicuous, formed by minute black shining tubercles. In short, this larva in very like a big specimen of a Eurema hecabe "^[1]

Pupa: "Much stouter (i.e. than that of Eurema hecabe, and the keel formed by the wing-cases much less pronounced. The normal colour is pale green with a yellow lateral line. We have never found it on any plant except Senna occidentalis. It habitually rests on the upperside along the midrib, like almost all Pierine larvae." Davidson and Aitken, quoted in Bingham.^[1]

References and notes

1. ^ ^{a b c} Bingham, C. T. (1907) Fauna of British India. Volume 2
2. ^ = C. javanica L.
3. ^ = C. javanica sensu Bojer
4. ^ Kunte, K. 2006. Additions to known larval host plants of Indian butterflies. J. Bombay Nat. Hist. Soc. 103(1):119-120
5. ^ Gaden S. Robinson, Phillip R. Ackery, Ian J. Kitching, George W. Beccaloni AND Luis M. Hernández HOSTS - a Database of the World's Lepidopteran Hostplants [1] Accessed September 2006
6. ^ J. B. Atluri, S. P. Venkata Ramana and C. Subba Reddi 2004 Ecobiology of the tropical pierid butterfly Catopsilia pyranthe. Current Science 86(3) [2]

See also

• List of butterflies of India (Pieridae)