pupa
(Photo: courtesy of Todd Burrows, South Stradbroke Island, Queensland)

The pupa is brown with darker markings. Its length is about 1 cm.

male
(Picture: courtesy of the Austraian National Insect Collection)

The male adults are blue on top.

male
(Specimen: courtesy of the Macleay Museum, University of Sydney)

The females are brown on top with a large white patch on each forewing, and a blue sheen near the base. The hindwings each have a black eye-spot at the tornus. Both sexes have a small tail at the hindwing tornus.

female
(Photo: courtesy of Todd Burrows, South Stradbroke Island, Queensland)

Underneath, the wings are fawn with arcs of darker markings, and both sexes have a black spot under each hindwing tornus.

male
(Photo: courtesy of Martin Purvis, McMahons Point, New South Wales)

The females also have a large white patch under each forewing. The butterflies have a wing span of about 2 cms.

female: underside
(Specimen: courtesy of the Macleay Museum, University of Sydney)

The eggs are laid on flower buds of a foodplant.

The species has been done in

and along most of the east coast of Australia, including

Further reading :

Michael F. Braby,
Butterflies of Australia,
CSIRO Publishing, Melbourne 2000, vol. 2, pp. 789-790.

Wesley Jenkinson,
Life history notes on the Hairy Line-blue Erysichton lineata lineata (Murray, 1874) Lepidoptera: Lycaenidae,
Butterflies and Other Invertebrates Club,
Metamorphosis Australia,
Issue 79 (December 2015), pp. 8-10.

Rev. Richard Paget Murray,
Descriptions of some new species belonging to the genus Lycaena,
Transactions of the Entomological Society of London,
Volume 22, Part 4 (1874), pp. 524-525, and also Plate 10, fig. 9.

Buck Richardson,
Tropical Queensland Wildlife from Dusk to Dawn Science and Art,
LeapFrogOz, Kuranda, 2015, p. 224.

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(updated 16 September 2010, 14 August 2024)