Bright Eyed Brown (previously known as Tisiphone cordace) SATYRINAE, NYMPHALIDAE, PAPILIONOIDEA | (donherbisonevans@yahoo.com) and Stella Crossley |
(Photo: courtesy of
Laura Levens, Upper Beaconsfield, Victoria)
The Caterpillars of this species feed nocturnally on various grasses such as:
By day, they hide in debris at the base of the foodplant. The early instars of this caterpillar are green, with a black head. Later instars are green or brown with darker lines along the body, and with a brown head and a forked tail. The caterpillars can grow to a leength of 3 cms.
The pupa is green with yellowish patches and black spots. Its length is about 1.5 cms. It is suspended head down by a cremaster from the foodplant or a nearby object.
The adults are dark brown with orange markings, and have one eyespot on each forewing and two on each hindwing. Underneath, the wings are similar but paler.
The butterflies have a wing span of about 4 cms. They can be found around swampy environments, where the larval foodplant grows.
The eggs are yellowish green, with a diameter of about 0.8 mm. Each egg is covered in about 40 columns of about 40 of shallow microscopic pits. The eggs are laid in groups of one to three on the undersides of lower leaves of a foodplant.
The species is found as several races :
in Tasmania:
Further reading :
Michael F. Braby,
Butterflies of Australia,
CSIRO Publishing, Melbourne 2000, vol. 2, pp. 518-520.
Carl Geyer,
Papiliones,
Zuträge zur Sammlung exotischer Schmettlinge,
Volume 4 (1832), p. 42, No. 399.
caterpillar | butterflies | Lepidoptera | moths | caterpillar |
(updated 1 May 2010, 17 December 2013, 17 June 2020, 24 September 2021)