| Lang's Short-tailed Blue (Leptotes pirithous (Linnaeus, 1767)) |
|
|
|
Scientific name: Leptotes pirithous (Linnaeus, 1767) Common name: Lang's Short-tailed Blue French name: Azuré de la luzerne Order: Lepidoptera Suborder: Rhopalocera Family: Lycaenidae Subfamily: Polyommatinae Wingspan: 24-26 mm. Biotope: Preference for dry locations, flower meadows, cultivated fields, fallow lands, in particular on coastal areas. Geographic area: Southern Europe, North Africa, Egypt, Asia Minor east to India and central Asia. There are some migrations towards the north. Flight time: February to October, the summer brood is the most important. Number of generations : 2 or 3. Caterpillar: Host plant: Lucerne and other leguminous plants. |
The upper side of the male's wings is violet-blue, the upper side of the female's wings is brown-grey with blue scaling near the body. The underside of the wings shows alternating brown and white wavy lines. The underside of the hindwing does not show the wide white band we can see on the Long-tailed Blue (Lampides boeticus). The hind wings bears a dark short queue. There are two small eye-spots at the base of the queue. These eye-spots have a black centre and are sometimes circled with orange. |
| [To know more about the Lang's Short-tailed Blue] [Next picture] [Top] |
|
I need to travel to the southern half of France to observe Lang's Short-tailed Blues. |
| [To know more about the Lang's Short-tailed Blue] [Next picture] [Previous picture] [Top] |
|
The brown-grey upper side of the wings with blue scaling near the body indicates that this one is a female. |
| [To know more about the Lang's Short-tailed Blue] [Next picture] [Previous picture] [Top] |
|
I have observed these Lang's Short-tailed Blues in a Lucerne field. |
| [To know more about the Lang's Short-tailed Blue] [Previous picture] [Top] |
|
These small blue butterflies were always moving and I had many difficulties to shoot a few pictures. |
André Bon July 2009