Butterflies of
Africa
Small Flame-bordered
Charaxes
Charaxes anticlea
DRURY, 1782
Family - NYMPHALIDAE
subfamily -
CHARAXINAE
Tribe - CHARAXINI
Charaxes anticlea,
Bobiri forest, Ghana
Introduction
The Charaxinae are a
group of robust, medium to large Nymphalids characterised by having a rapid and
powerful flight, stout bodies, triangular forewings, and a habit of feeding
at dung and carrion.
They
are represented in the neotropics by genera including
Consul, Memphis, Prepona
and Agrias;
in the Oriental and Australian regions by
Polyura
and Charaxes,
and in Africa by Charaxes, Palla
and Euxanthe.
The
genus Charaxes
contains 179 African species, one of which - jasius,
extends it's range as far north as the Mediterranean coast of Europe. Most are
forest-dwellers, but several are adapted to savannah and arid
Acacia thorn scrub habitats.
Charaxes
anticlea is distributed from Sierra Leone to Angola and western Kenya.
Habitats
This is primarily a rainforest species, but it can also be found in quite dry
and open types of forest, and in savannah / woodland mosaics where it inhabits
the denser Acacia thickets.
Lifecycle
The larval foodplants are
Acacia and Mezoneuron
( Fabaceae ).
Adult behaviour
Unlike most
Charaxes species it is common to see males of
anticlea basking with wings
outspread, usually quite low down on herbage. One unsavoury habit
that it does have in common with other
Charaxes species is a perverse liking for disgusting substances. It
has a particular fondness for dung, into which it probes avidly
with it's long proboscis, imbibing foul fluids from which it
derives sodium and other minerals that are passed to females
during copulation.
|
