The Dark Cerulean is a small butterfly

Butterfly

A butterfly is a mainly day-flying insect of the order Lepidoptera, which includes the butterflies and moths. Like other holometabolous insects, the butterfly's life cycle consists of four parts: egg, larva, pupa and adult. Most species are diurnal. Butterflies have large, often brightly coloured...

 found in India

India

India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...

 that belongs to the Lycaenids or Blues

Lycaenidae

The Lycaenidae are the second-largest family of butterflies, with about 6000 species worldwide, whose members are also called gossamer-winged butterflies...

 family.

Description

Male upperside, fore wing: velvety jet-black; base deep blue, beautifully metallic and shining, measured on the dorsum this colour occupies three-fourths of its length from base, its outer margin then curves upwards just past the apex of the cell, entera into the bases of interspaces 10, 11 and 12 and fills the whole of the cell. Hind wing: costal margin above subcostal vein and vein 7, and dorsal margin narrowly fuscous black, a medial longitudinal pale streak on the former; terminal margin narrowly edged with velvety black, inside which in interspaces 1 and 2 is a slender transverse whitish line, with an elongate irregular transverse black spot above it in interspace 1 and a more obscure similar spot in interspace 2; traces of such spots also are present in some specimens in the anterior interspaces. Cilia of both fore and hind wings black; filamentous tail at apex of vein 2 black tipped with white. Underside : dark chocolate-brown. Fore and hind wings; transversely crossed by the following very slender white Hues all more or less broken into short pieces:—Fore wing: a short pair one on each side of and parallel to the discocellulars, a pale streak along the discocellulars themselves; a single line in continuation of the outer of the discocellular lines, extends down to vein 1; an upper discal pair of lines that form a more or less catenulated short band extend from the costa to vein 3, the inner line of the two continued to vein 1; two more obscure subterminal and a single terminal line, the area enclosed between the subterminal lines and between them and the terminal line darker in the interspaces, giving the appearance of two obscure subterminal lines of spots edged inwardly and outwardly by white lines. Hind wing: crossed by nine very broken and irregular lines; tracing them from the costa downwards their middle short pieces are found to be shifted outwards and a few are short and not complete, the inner two are posteriorly bent abruptly upwards, the subtcrminal two are lunular and the terminal line nearly continuous; posteriorly between the subterminal pair of lines in interspace 1 there is a small black spot inwardly edged with dark ochraceous, and in interspace 2 a much larger round black spot, both black spots are touched with metallic blue scales. Antennae, head, thorax and abdomen black, the shafts of the antennae speckled with white; beneath: palpi, thorax and abdomen narrowly white down the middle.

Female. Similar to the male generally but with the following differences: upperside, fore wing: ground-colour fuscous opaque black, not velvety black, blue basal area more restricted and not so deep a blue nor at all metallic. Hind wing: the black costal and terminal margins very much broader, the blue on the basal area consequently much.restricted and of the same shade as the blue on the fore wing; terminal margin with a subterminal anteriorly obsolescent series of spots of a shade darker than that of the terminal black area on which they are superposed; these spots posteriorly more or less distinctly encircled with slender lines of bluish white, anteriorly these lines are almost obsolete. Cilia of both fore and hind wings and the filamentous short tail as in the male. Underside: similar to that oE the cf but the ground-colour generally paler and duller; the transverse white lines broader and more dearly defined. Antenna, head, thorax and abdomen as in the male.

Distribution

Peninsular India, but not in the very dry or desert tracts; Ceylon; Assam; Burma; Tenasserim; the Andamans; extending in the Malayan Subregion to Australia.

Lifecycle

"The larva which we have taken at Karwar in June is hardly distinguishable from that of Catochrysops pandava, Horsfield ; it is, however, covered with minute hairs and is generally of an olive-green colour and without the reddish suffusion so generally noticed in C. pandava. The pupa is indistinguishable from that of C. pandava. The larva feeds on Xylia dolabrifornis, and also on the flowers of Butea frondosa." Other food plants noted include Millettia peguensis

Millettia peguensis

Millettia peguensis, the Moulmein rosewood , is a legume tree species in the genus Millettia. It is native to Lower Burma and Siam. This is a relatively rare tree as compared to Pongam that is very similar looking, but more common in India. Pongam has white flowers while the Milletia flowers are...

.

External links

• Asahi Correctly determined photos of J. bochus from the Philippines
  Philippines
  The Philippines , officially known as the Republic of the Philippines , is a country in Southeast Asia in the western Pacific Ocean. To its north across the Luzon Strait lies Taiwan. West across the South China Sea sits Vietnam...
  
  

See also

• Lycaenidae
  Lycaenidae
  The Lycaenidae are the second-largest family of butterflies, with about 6000 species worldwide, whose members are also called gossamer-winged butterflies...
  
  
• List of butterflies of India
• List of butterflies of India (Lycaenidae)