Sighting of Aglais cashmirensis aesis Fruhstorfer, 1912 (Nymphalidae)
from Nagaland, India
Tshetsholo Naro
North
East Network, P.O. Chizami, PhekDistrict, Nagaland, 797102, India
Email: tshetsholo@gmail.com
Date of publication (online): 26 April 2012
Date of publication (print): 26 April 2012
ISSN 0974-7907 (online) | 0974-7893 (print)
Editor:Peter Smetacek
Manuscript
details:
Ms # o3019
Received 23 November 2011
Final received 24 February 2012
Finally accepted 10 March 2012
Citation: Naro, T. (2012). Sighting of Aglais cashmirensis aesis Fruhstorfer,
1912 (Nymphalidae) from Nagaland, India. Journal of
Threatened Taxa 4(4): 2534–2535.
Copyright:© Tshetsholo Naro 2012. Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 UnportedLicense. JoTT allows unrestricted use of this
article in any medium for non-profit purposes, reproduction and distribution by
providing adequate credit to the authors and the source of publication.
Acknowledgement: I would like to thank North East Network
(NEN) for involving me in the nature conservation education programme.
I offer my admiration and gratitude to Payal Bhojwani Molur, Maya Khosla and Rita Banerji for their
relentless guidance and mentoring through the nature conservation education programme in Chizami Nagaland,
which pulled me into the world of butterflies. Most of all, I am obliged to Sanjay Sondhiwho taught me the intricacies of butterfly watching and identification and also
helped me in drafting this manuscript.
The butterflies of Nagaland
are not well known. Some early
studies of butterflies of the Naga Hills include the work of Tytler (1915). Subsequently, Tytler (1940) also published
records of butterflies from neighbouring Burma. Here, I report the presence of Aglais cashmirensis aesis Fruhstorfer from Nagaland, extending its known range.
Since January 2011, I have
been observing and photographing butterflies in and around Chizami(25024’0’’N & 94024’0’’E; 981m) in the Phek District of Nagaland, 88km from the state capital, Kohima. The
observations were opportunistic. The butterflies were photographed using digital cameras. The butterflies were identified using Kehimkar (2008) and Evans (1932) and the images were
confirmed by Sanjay Sondhi, TitliTrust, Dehradun. Amongst the species that were
identified was the Indian Tortoiseshell Aglais cashmirensis aesis.
Aglais cashmirensis aesis is the eastern subspecies
of Aglais cashmirensis Kollar with a known distribution from Shimla(Himachal Pradesh) eastwards to western Arunachal Pradesh. Aglais cashmirensis cashmirensis is the western subspecies, which is known from Kulu (Himachal Pradesh) west to Pakistan.
Aglais cashimirensis aesis is a
resident of Chizami and is well established
throughout the area. The butterfly
was photographed on 16 June 2011 (Image 1). It is on the wing throughout the year and has been recorded
in all months from March to October. It has been noted mainly on exotic garden flowers in open spaces,
basking on rocks, the ground, or on roadsides. It can be seen flying close to
the ground and is seen mostly on sunny days. Its larval food plant, Urtica species (Nettles) grows
abundantly in the area.
In recent literature, Kehimkar (2008) reported the easternmost distribution of Aglais cashmirensis as Sikkim. Haribal(1992) too, reported its presence in Sikkim. Older literature too, including Wynter-Blyth (1957) and Evans (1932), mention the
easternmost distribution as Sikkim. More recently, Manari (2010) clarified that
the range of Aglais cashmirensis actually extended further
eastwards to Arunachal Pradesh and reported its presence in Rupain western Arunachal Pradesh, noting that the presence of Aglais cashmirensis in that area had already
been reported by Betts (1950) but had been overlooked by subsequent authors.
Publications on butterflies
by Tytler (1915), whose work covered the Naga Hills
and Manipur does not report this species from the area. In their report on the butterflies of
the Khasi and Jaintiahills, Parson & Cantlie (1948) state, “Although
there is no reason why this species should not be found on the high plateau, we
know of no record”.
In more recent butterfly
surveys in northeastern India including the South GaroHills, Meghalaya (Sanjay Sondhi pers. comm. 07 July
2011), Namdapha Tiger Reserve in eastern Arunachal
Pradesh (unpublished checklist Sanjay Sondhi) and theDibang Dihang Biosphere
Reserve (Borang 2008) from the higher elevations of
central Arunachal Pradesh, there have been no records of Aglais cashmirensis.
Finally, there have been no
records of this species from the neighboring countries of Bangladesh (Larsen
2004) and Myanmar (Tytler 1940; Kinyon2004).
The record of Aglais cashmirensis aesis from Chizami,Phek District, Nagaland extends its known range significantly
eastwards from western Arunachal Pradesh. It is, however, surprising that there have been no reported sightings of
this butterfly from the area between there and Nagaland, specifically eastern
Assam and Arunachal Pradesh.
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