Charaxes anticlea
Charaxes anticlea, the small flame-bordered charaxes, is a butterfly in the family Nymphalidae. It is found in Senegal, Guinea-Bissau, Guinea, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Ivory Coast, Ghana, Togo, Nigeria, Cameroon, Gabon, the Republic of the Congo, the Central African Republic, Angola, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania and Zambia.
Description
Ch. anticlea Drury male: wings above deep black; forewing at the hinder angle between the hindmargin and vein 3 with a triangular orange submarginal band, which is only 1 mm. from the distal margin; hindwing above with an orange band, anteriorly narrower, in the middle about 8 mm. in breadth, which encloses 4—6 black, white-centred submarginal spots; above strongly recalls the male of protoclea In the female the wings are black-brown above, with a common, nearly straight, light orange median band, which on the hindwing is 9 mm. in breadth and in cellules 5—7 of the forewing is divided into two branches; hindwing with a continuous orange marginal line only about 2 mm. in breadth. Sierra Leone and Ashanti. — adusta Rothsch.
only differs in the male in having the orange submarginal band of the forewing 2 mm. from the distal margin and in the female in the orange marginal line of the hindwing being partly broken up into spots. Gameroons to Angola and Uganda.
A full description is also given by Walter Rothschild and Karl Jordan, 1900 Novitates Zoologicae Volume 7:287-524. page 492 et seq.
Biology
The habitat consists of forests, including dry forests, and dense riverine vegetation.Both sexes are attracted to rotting fruit and tree sap.
The larvae feed on Acacia poetzi, Acacia pennata, Mezoneuron benthamianum, Acacia goetzei, Acacia brevispica, Mezoneuron welwitschianum and Mezoneuron angolense.
Subspecies
- Charaxes anticlea anticlea
- Charaxes anticlea adusta Rothschild, 1900
- Charaxes anticlea mwera Vingerhoedt & Thiry, 1996
- Charaxes anticlea proadusta van Someren, 1971