Tsitana Evans, 1937

Cock, Matthew J. W. & Congdon, T. Colin E., 2014, Observations on the biology of Afrotropical Hesperiidae (Lepidoptera). Part 7. Hesperiinae incertae sedis: grass and bamboo feeders, Zootaxa 3872 (4), pp. 301-354 : 303

publication ID

https://doi.org/ 10.11646/zootaxa.3872.4.1

publication LSID

lsid:zoobank.org:pub:8FECCFC1-7CA9-4A90-B881-4BD40157AD99

DOI

https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.5680958

persistent identifier

https://treatment.plazi.org/id/03AA87B3-FFC4-3503-FF79-FD4822C0DA34

treatment provided by

Plazi

scientific name

Tsitana Evans, 1937
status

 

Tsitana Evans, 1937 View in CoL

There are five species of this exclusively southern African genus, four from South Africa discussed below, and Tsitana wallacei Neave from Zambia and the adjoining DR Congo and Tanzania ( Evans 1937, Ackery et al. 1995). The four South African species are grass feeders, but only T. uitenhaga Evans has been documented.

Tsitana tsita (Trimen) View in CoL and T. uitenhaga View in CoL are reported to feed on Stipa dregeana View in CoL ( Murray 1959, Dickson & Kroon 1978, Pringle et al. 1994, Henning et al. 1997). Stipa dregeana View in CoL has been treated as a synonym of S. keniensis View in CoL , but this does not seem to be generally accepted as yet. Although Evans (1937) and Ackery et al. (1995) treat uitenhaga View in CoL as a subspecies of T. tsita View in CoL , South African workers treat the two as separate species ( Dickson & Kroon 1978, Pringle et al. 1994, Henning et al. 1997, Woodhall 2005). Clark (in Dickson & Kroon 1978) illustrates the complete life history of T. uitenhaga View in CoL . The ovum is dome-shaped, relatively tall, and rather smooth. The caterpillars are green, long and cylindrical, and there are six instars; the head is marked with brown and white in the final instar, black and white in the earlier instars, and plain black in the first instar. The pupa is white, cylindrical, downturned at the cremaster, with a dark head bearing a pair of short, upward-directed projections.

Tsitana tulbagha Evans View in CoL was recorded from Pseudopentameris macrantha View in CoL (as Pentameris macrantha View in CoL ) by Murray (1959). However, subsequent authors refer to the food plant as a coarse tussock grass, Danthonia View in CoL spp. ( Dickson & Kroon 1978) or Merxmuellera View in CoL spp. ( Pringle et al. 1994, Henning et al. 1997), the latter genus having been separated from the former, and correctly applied to the African species. Tsitana dicksoni Evans View in CoL is recorded from Pseudopentameris macrantha View in CoL (as Pentameris macrantha View in CoL ) by Murray (1959), which is subsequently referred to as probably P. macrantha View in CoL ( Dickson & Kroon 1978, Pringle et al. 1994, Henning et al. 1997).

Kingdom

Animalia

Phylum

Arthropoda

Class

Insecta

Order

Lepidoptera

Family

Hesperiidae

GBIF Dataset (for parent article) Darwin Core Archive (for parent article) View in SIBiLS Plain XML RDF