Oreixenica latialis Waterhouse & Lyell, 1914
Alpine Silver Xenica
SATYRINAE,   NYMPHALIDAE,   PAPILIONOIDEA
 
Don Herbison-Evans
(donherbisonevans@yahoo.com)
and
Stella Crossley

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

These Caterpillars are initially green with a black head. Later instars are brown with indistinct longitudinal lines. The caterpillars have a brown head that has a pair of small horns, and twoprojections on the anal segment. The caterpillars feed on various species of Grass (POACEAE) including :

  • Soft Snow Grass ( Poa hiemata ).

    The pupa is brown, with a white dorsal abdominal ridge.

    Oreixenica latialis
    female, drawing by Gustavus Athol Waterhouse & George Lyell,
    The Butterflies of Australia,
    Angus & Robertson, 1914, Sydney, Plate 40, fig. 824,
    image courtesy of Biodiversity Heritage Library, digitized by Museum Victoria.

    The wings of the adult butterflies are brown with yellow patches. On the upper surfaces, each wing has an eyespot.

    Oreixenica latialis
    male, drawing by Gustavus Athol Waterhouse & George Lyell,
    The Butterflies of Australia,
    Angus & Robertson, 1914, Sydney, Plate 40, fig. 823,
    image courtesy of Biodiversity Heritage Library, digitized by Museum Victoria.

    Underneath, the forewings are similar, but each hindwing has two eyespots. The butterflies have a wing span of about 3 cms.

    Oreixenica latialis
    male underside, drawing by Gustavus Athol Waterhouse & George Lyell,
    The Butterflies of Australia,
    Angus & Robertson, 1914, Sydney, Plate 40, fig. 823,
    image courtesy of Biodiversity Heritage Library, digitized by Museum Victoria.

    The species is found as two races:

  • latialis,
  • theddora Couchman, 1953,

    in the mountains of

  • New South Wales,
  • Australian Capital Territory, and
  • Victoria.

    Oreixenica latialis
    egg, magnified
    (Photo: courtesy of Ken Walker, Hotham Heights, Victoria)

    The eggs are pale green and spherical, and covered in a microscopic tracery of about a 1,000 interlinked hexagons. The eggs have a diameter of about 0.7 mm. They are laid singly on the underside of leaves of a foodplant.


    Further reading :

    Michael F. Braby,
    Butterflies of Australia, CSIRO Publishing, Melbourne 2000, vol. 2, pp. 494-495.

    Gustavus Athol Waterhouse & George Lyell,
    The Butterflies of Australia,
    Angus & Robertson, 1914, Sydney, p. 43, No. 41d, and also Plate 40, figs. 823, 824.


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    (updated 21 July 2004, 14 April 2015, 12 March 2016, 26 June 2020, 26 Septermber 2021)