Journal of Threatened Taxa | www.threatenedtaxa.org | 26 March 2021 | 13(3): 18039–18041

 

ISSN 0974-7907 (Online) | ISSN 0974-7893 (Print) 

https://doi.org/10.11609/jott.5938.13.3.18039-18041

#5938 | Received 01 April 2020 | Final received 05 January 2021 | Finally accepted 28 February 2021

 

 

Actinor radians (Moore, 1878) (Hesperiidae: Hesperiinae: Aeromachini): addition to the butterfly fauna of Haryana, India

 

Bitupan Boruah 1, Rajesh Chahal 2  & Abhijit Das 3

 

1,3 Wildlife Institute of India, Post Box: 18, Chandrabani, Dehradun, Uttarakhand 248002, India.

2 Kalesar National Park, Yamunanagar, Haryana 135021, India.

1 bitupan.kaz@gmail.com (corresponding author), 2 iwlsultanpur@gmail.com, 3 abhijit@wii.gov.in

 

 

 

Editor: Sanjay Sondhi, Titli Trust, Dehradun, India.         Date of publication: 26 March 2021 (online & print)

 

Citation: Boruah, B., R. Chahal & A. Das (2021). Actinor radians (Moore, 1878) (Hesperiidae: Hesperiinae: Aeromachini): addition to the butterfly fauna of Haryana, India.  Journal of Threatened Taxa 13(3): 18039–18041. https://doi.org/10.11609/jott.5938.13.3.18039-18041

 

Copyright: © Boruah et al. 2021. Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.  JoTT allows unrestricted use, reproduction, and distribution of this article in any medium by providing adequate credit to the author(s) and the source of publication.

 

Funding: None.

 

Competing interests: The authors declare no competing interests.

 

Acknowledgements: We are thankful to Haryana Forest Department and Director, Wildlife Institute of India for giving us permission to visit Kalesar National Park.  We thank the forest staff for their help during the visit and Amir Lone, Pallavi Ghaskadbi, & Kumudani Bala Gautam for helping in this work.

 

 

 

Actinor Watson, 1893 is a monotypic genus represented by Actinor radians (Moore, 1878).  The species is distributed in western Himalaya (from Kumaon in India to Chitral in Pakistan) (Evans 1932).  Moore (1878) described the species from Dharmasala, Himachal Pradesh under the genus Halpe Moore, 1878.  Subsequently, the species was reported from Mandi, Himachal Pradesh (Elwes & Edwards 1897), Doon Valley (Mackinnon & de Nicéville 1898), Utzen Valley (Leslie & Evans 1903; Evans 1910), and Chitral in Pakistan (Evans 1912).  Singh & Bhandari (2003) included the species in the list of Dehra-Dun valley following Mackinnon & de Nicéville (1898).  Kumar (2010) recorded the species from Jharipani and Bhatta Phal Village of Mussoorie based on the collection of Zoological Survey of India (ZSI) in 2003 and 2002 respectively; however, the authors did not provide detailed information on the record of the species.  Interestingly, this record has not been cited in the list of butterflies from Garhwal, Uttarakhand by Singh & Sondhi (2016), though Sondhi & Kunte (2018) do mention the ZSI records.  Recently, Tshikolovets & Pagès (2016) reported the species from Kohala, Muzzafarabad, Pakistan at an elevation range of 700–800 m.  Currently, this scarce species is known from Chitral to Uttarakhand through Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh (Kangra, Kullu, Simla) and north Punjab (Chandigarh) within an elevation range of 600–2,400 m (van Gasse 2017).

In one of our visits to Kalesar National Park (KNP), Haryana (Figure 1), we encountered a single individual of A. radians (Image 1) at 21.04h on 09 August 2019.  We photographed the species and later identified with the help of the description provided by Moore (1878), Watson (1893), Elwes & Edwards (1897), Sondhi & Kunte (2018), and the photograph available in www.ifoundbutterflies.org (Anonymous 2020).  The species recorded from KNP is confirmed as A. radians by the combination of the following characters: discal band of the forewing is irregular and continuous, lower angle of the spots of the discal band continued outward along the veins; three apical spots on forewing shifted in from the discal band; the post discal band of the hindwing continuous from the vein 1b to 6, the medial band from the vein 1b passes across end cell upto vein 8, top most spot between vein 7 and 8 of the hindwing shifted out from the medial band; a basal spot present between upper border of the cell and vein 8 on the hindwing; margin of the hindwing yellow; vein 2 of the hindwing nearer to the end cell than the base of the wing; vein 3 of the hindwing originates immediately before the end cell; vein 5 of the hindwing distinctly traceable; vein 7 of the hindwing is close to end cell and originating at an acute angle; all the veins and discal bands pale yellow; antennae with slender club and sharp hook at the tip.

We recorded the species near a perennial stream (30.314˚N & 77.564˚E) at an elevation of 345m, approximately 70m downstream of Chand Sot dam in Tajewala, southeastern part of KNP.  The individual was observed perching on a grass blade of Saccharum bengalense at a height of one meter above ground (Image 1).  The bank of the stream at the recorded site is mostly covered by Saccharum bengalense, Parthenium hysterophorus along with other shrubs and some broad leaf trees, bamboo at the edge (Image 2).

Kalesar National Park is located in the eastern part of Yamunanagar, Haryana, in the Shivalik range, south of Himalaya.  The river Yamuna described the eastern boundary of the park.  The park is primarily dominated by Sal and Khair forest with scattered grassland.

The present record of Actinor radians from KNP is the lowest distribution limit (elevation 345m).  The present record extend its range ca. 40km from nearest known location (Dehradun Valley) as well as first report of the species from the state of Haryana.  The species was not reported in earlier studies by Sethy & Ray (2010) and Ranade (2017) from KNP.  With the present record the number of butterflies of Kalesar National Park increases to 40.  This report highlights the paucity of knowledge on faunal diversity especially lower taxa in the region as well as importance of the last remaining forest at the extreme end of the Terai Arc landscape.

 

For figure & images - - click here

 

 

References

 

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