Jalmenus inous Hewitson, [1865]
Varied Hairstreak
 (one synonym : Ialmenus menecles Doubleday, 1847)
ZESIINI,   THECLINAE,   LYCAENIDAE,   PAPILIONOIDEA
  
Don Herbison-Evans,
(donherbisonevans@yahoo.com)
and
Stella Crossley

The Caterpillar is flat and brown with light and dark dorsal stripes. It has tubercles on the thorax and last abdominal segent each with a bunch of short white hairs. It rest by day on the stems of foodplants just below ground level, and climbs up to feed nocturnally . Its foodplants include :

  • Sandplain Poison ( Gastrolobium microcarpum, FABACEAE ),
  • Marno ( Daviesia divaricata, FABACEAE ),
  • Spiny Bitter Pea ( Daviesia benthamii, FABACEAE ),
  • Golden Wreath Wattle ( Acacia saligna, MIMOSACEAE ),

    and is always to be attended by numbers of small black ants :

  • Iridomyrmex conifer ( DOLICHODERINAE ), or
  • Iridomyrmex rufoniger ( DOLICHODERINAE ).

    The pupa is attached to the foodplant stem, again just below ground level.


    male
    (Photo: courtesy of CSIRO/BIO Photography Group, Centre for Biodiversity Genomics, University of Guelph)

    The adult is metallic blue in colour with wide black wing margins. The veins on the hind wings are extended. The male is slightly greener and has straighter margins than the female.


    female
    (Specimen: courtesy of the Macleay Museum, University of Sydney)

    The under-surfaces of the wings are brown, marked with arcs of darker brown spots, and a subterminal arc of pale chevrons. There are orange-edged black spots under the rear margin of each hind wing. The wingspan is about 3 cms.


    underside
    (Specimen: courtesy of the Macleay Museum, University of Sydney)

    The species occurs in

  • Western Australia as two subspecies :

  • inousnear the coast, and
  • notocrucifer Johnson, Hay & Bollam, 1992, inland.

    Further reading :

    Michael F. Braby,
    Butterflies of Australia, CSIRO Publishing, Melbourne 2000, vol. 2, pp. 730-731.

    William Chapman Hewitson,
    Lycaenidae,
    Illustrations of Diurnal Lepidoptera,
    London, Volume 2 (1865), p. 54, No. 3, and also Plate 24, figs. 1,2.

    Bob Miller,
    Description of the egg of Jalmenus inous inous (Hewitson) (lepidoptera: lycaenidae),
    Butterflies and Other Invertebrates Club,
    Metamorphosis Australia,
    Issue 52 (March 2009), p. 18.

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    (updated 24 June 2002, 14 August 2024)