Butterflies of
Thailand, Malaysia &
Borneo
Malay Red Harlequin
Paralaxita damajanti
FELDER & FELDER, 1860
Family - RIODINIDAE
subfamily -
RIODININAE
Tribe -
introduction
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habitats |
lifecycle |
adult behaviour
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Paralaxita
damajanti damajanti, Taman Negara, West Malaysia |
Introduction
The
Malay Red Harlequin is something of an enigma.
Butterflies use brilliant colours for a variety of purposes - to attract the
attention of potential mates, to advertise their unpalatability, or to confuse,
startle or warn avian predators. They tend to occupy sunlit areas where
their bright colours can be shown to their best advantage. Not so with
this species, which
is normally seen only as a silhouette in the shadowy undergrowth, and
where it's flight is so quick and erratic that it is almost impossible to see
where it has settled.
The explanation for the
striking appearance could be connected to the fact that insects can see well
beyond the visible spectrum, into the ultra-violet. In semi darkness the
butterfly is almost invisible to mammalian, reptilian or avian eyes, but the
distinctive pattern and contrasting colours may reflect a strong ultra-violet
trademark that could be essential to enable potential mates to locate each
other.
The
genus Paralaxita
contains 4 species - damajanti, telesia, orphna
and dora.
There are 2 other closely related genera with very similar species - Laxita,
and Taxila.
All the species in these 3 genera are confined to Sundaland, the geographical
region which encompasses Thailand, peninsular Malaysia, Sumatra, Borneo, Palawan
and Java.
Paralaxita damajanti
occurs in peninsular Malaysia, Sumatra and Borneo.
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Paralaxita
damajanti damajanti, Taman Negara, West Malaysia |
Habitats
This species occurs in
dense rainforest at altitudes between about 200-1200m.
Lifecycle
The early stages appear
to be unknown.
Adult behaviour
The butterflies are very difficult to locate, and invariably
encountered singly. They are usually seen when accidentally
disturbed while the entomologist is hacking through thick
undergrowth, at which time they suddenly take
flight and resettle a few metres away in darkness, on the surface
of a leaf.
Females have a habit of hopping incessantly from leaf to leaf - in
Taman Negara I found a female which was working it's way up and
down the leaves of
a vine, pausing only for a second on each leaf. This went on for
several minutes. Females of many butterflies habitually fly from
leaf to leaf "tasting" each leaf with sensors on their feet,
trying to locate the correct species of plant on which to lay
their eggs. In this case however photographs revealed that the
butterfly was imbibing from the surface of the leaves each time it
landed, and it seems that the hopping activity is a defence
strategy aimed at birds or reptiles which would be unable to react
quickly enough to catch the very active butterfly. It was also
very effective as a defence against photographers - to obtain the
photographs on this page I had to spend several minutes
frantically struggling to frame the butterfly in the viewfinder,
with no more than a second to focus and compose each time it
landed !
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