Ogyris otanes

Ogyris otanes (C. Felder & R. Felder, 1865)
Small Brown Azure
ARHOPALINI, THECLINAE, LYCAENIDAE, PAPILIONOIDEA

Don Herbison-Evans,
(donherbisonevans@yahoo.com)
and
Stella Crossley

Ogyris otanes
(Photo: courtesy of Museums Victoria)

This Caterpillar is white, with black spiracles, and a brown head. It has two flaps, one each side of the tail, which are said to emit a chemical which pacifies the ants. It lives in a nest of any of several species of :

Sugar Ants ( eg. Camponotus terebrans, FORMICINAE ).

It feeds on the shoots and bark of plants in SANTALACEAE such as :

Sour Bush ( Choretrum glomeratum ),

Spiked Sour-bush ( Choretrum spicatum ), and

Currant Bush ( Leptomeria preissiana ).

The caterpillar grows to a length of about 2.5 cms.

(Photo: courtesy of Museums Victoria)

The pupa is pale with a brown dorsal stripe, and has a length of about 1.5 cms. Pupation occurs within the host ants nest.

male
(Photo: courtesy of Museum Victoria)

> The adults are a purple with a bronze sheen on top, with scalloped wing margins. However, the females also have a broad black band around the margins, and a white patch near the tip of each forewing.

female
(Photo: courtesy of Museums Victoria)

Underneath, the wings are fawn, with an arc of black spots and a pair of black and white spots under each forewing, looking like a pair of eyes with eyebrows. The butterflies have a wing span of about 4 cms.

egg, magnified
(Photo: courtesy of Ken Walker, Big Desert, Victoria)

The eggs are dome shaped, and grey with a network of white polygonal ribs. The eggs have a diameter of about 1 mm. They are laid in groups of one to four on debris at the base of a foodplant.

The species has been found in various localities in the southern half of the Australian mainland including

the Big Desert in north-western Victoria,
but its habitat there has been largely destroyed, and so it is now most commonly found on

Kangaroo Island and other undisturbed areas in South Australia, and also in

Western Australia.