Croitana arenaria

Croitana arenaria Edwards 1979
Inland Sand-skipper
TRAPEZITINAE, HESPERIIDAE, HESPERIOIDEA

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

Male
(Photo: courtesy of Roger Grund, Butterfly Conservation South Australia Inc.)

This Caterpillar is brown with a dark dorsal line, and paler lines along the sides. It feeds on various species of Grass :

Flat Awned Speargrass ( Austrostipa platychaeta ),

Feather Speargrass ( Austrostipa elegantissima ), and

Curly Windmill Grass ( Enteropogon acicularis ),

all of POACEAE. It makes a shelter from a rolled leaf of the foodplant, with the opening at the bottom,in which it rests head down. It pupates in the shelter, also head down.

The adult butterfly is dark brown with a series of yellow spots on each forewing, and a yellow patch on each hindwing. Underneath, the pattern is similar but paler. All the wings are edged with a border of white spots. The wingspan is about 2 cms.

The species is found in

Northern Territory, and

South Australia.

Further reading :

Michael F. Braby,
Butterflies of Australia, CSIRO Publishing, Melbourne 2000, vol. 1, pp. 179-180.

Ted Edwards,
Two new species of Croitana Waterhouse (Lepidoptera: Hesperiidae) from central Australia,
Australian Entomological Magazine,
Volume 6, Part 2 (1979), p. 34, figs 1-4, 15, 16.