Euploea leucostictos (Gmelin, 1790)
Orange-flash Crow
(one synonym : Euploea usipetes Hewitson, 1858)
DANAINAE,   NYMPHALIDAE,   PAPILIONOIDEA
 
Don Herbison-Evans
(donherbisonevans@yahoo.com)
and
Stella Crossley

Euploea leucostictos
female
(Specimen: courtesy of the The Australian Museum)

The adult butterflies of this species are dark brown, and usually a paler area on the rear of each hindwing. The males have a round orange sex mark near the middle of each forewing. The adult butterflies have a wing span around 6 cms.

Euploea leucostictos
female, underside
(Photo: courtesy of Mark Rosenstein, Fiji)

Various subspecies are found in

  • Fiji,
  • New Guinea,
  • Sulawesi,

    and in Australia in

  • Queensland on Dauan Island, Torres Strait.

    Euploea leucostictos
    male, drawing by William Chapman Hewitson, listed as Euploea usipetes
    ,
    Illustrations of new species of exotic butterflies,
    Volume 1 (1858), Plate 34, fig. 4,
    image courtesy of Biodiversity Heritage Library, digitized by Smithsonian Libraries.


    Further reading :

    Johann Friedrich Gmelin,
    1790 Systema Naturae per Regna Tria Naturae, secundum classes, ordines, genera, species, cum characteribus, differentiis, synonymis, locis. Linné, editio decima tertia, aucta, reformata,
    Regnum Animalium,
    Leipzig (Lipsiae) : G.E. Beer Volume 1, Part 5 (1790). p. 2289, No. 889.

    William Chapman Hewitson,
    Danaidae: Euploea
    Illustrations of new species of exotic butterflies,
    London, Volume 1 (1858) p. 66, No. 4, and Plate 34, fig. 4.


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    (updated 8 September 2003, 5 December 2013, 17 June 2020)