The Clipper (Parthenos sylvia) is a species of nymphalid butterfly found in South and South-East Asia, mostly in forested areas. The Clipper is a fast flying butterfly and has a habit of flying with its wings flapping stiffly between the horizontal position and a few degrees below the horizontal. It may glide between spurts of flapping.

Description

Male and female. Upperside : ground-colour a bright purple, the subhyaline white spots near the apex of cell in the fore wing more opaque, the broad discal band of large white spots proportionately more basal further from the termen and very irregular, the spots, especially towards the hinder part of the wing, more widely separated, the spot in interspace 5 more acutely triangular and smaller, the two spots above shifted obliquely inwards towards the costa, making the outer margin of the discal band angulate at interspaces 5 and 6. Hind wing: the postdiscal and sub-terminal markings broader and more diffuse than in P. gambrisius, giving a dark shade to the whole of the apical half of the wing.

Underside pale greenish grey. Fore wing: the spots and markings except the basal black streaks as on the upperside, the groundcolour fading to an ashy grey towards the terminal margin. Hind wing similar to the underside of hind wing of P. gambrisius, but the discal transverse sinuous black line very broken and incomplete, the postdiscal, subterminal and terminal black markings somewhat better denned. Antennae black; head, thorax and abdomen bronze green, barred with black above ; beneath whitish.

Range

Western Ghats, Bangladesh, Assam, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, and Southeast Asia (Malaya, Philippines, and New Guinea).

Life history

Larva. Cylindrical; head and anal segment with short simple spines; segments 3 to 12 with longer branched spines, reddish brown in colour, those on 3 and 4 comparatively very long. Colour pale green, with yellowish-white lateral stripes one on each side. Pupa "brown, boat-shaped." (After Davidson & Aitken)

Subspecies

Listed alphabetically.

P. s. admiralia Rothschild, 1915
P. s. apicalis Moore, 1878
P. s. aruana Moore,
P. s. bandana Fruhstorfer
P. s. bellimontis Fruhstorfer, 1899
P. s. borneensis Staudinger, 1889
P. s. brunnea Staudinger, 1888
P. s. couppei Ribbe, 1898
P. s. cyaneus Moore, 1877
P. s. ellina Fruhstorfer, 1899
P. s. gambrisius (Fabricius, 1787)
P. s. guineensis Fruhstorfer, 1899
P. s. joloensis Fruhstorfer, 1899
P. s. lilacinus Butler, 1879 – Blue Clipper
P. s. nodrica (Boisduval, 1832)
P. s. numita Fruhstorfer
P. s. obiana Fruhstorfer, 1904
P. s. pherekrates Fruhstorfer, 1904
P. s. pherekides Fruhstorfer, 1904
P. s. philippinensis Fruhstorfer, 1899 – Brown Clipper
P. s. roepstorfii Moore,
P. s. salentia (Hopffer, 1874)
P. s. silvicola Fruhstorfer, 1897
P. s. sulana Fruhstorfer, 1899
P. s. sumatrensis Fruhstorfer, 1899
P. s. sylla (Donovan, 1798)
P. s. theriotes Fruhstorfer
P. s. thesaurinus Grose-Smith, 1897
P. s. thesaurus Mathew, 1887
P. s. tualensis Fruhstorfer, 1899
P. s. ugiensis Fruhstorfer
P. s. virens Moore, 1877

Larva


Blue Clipper


Race philippensis


Brown Clipper


Ventral view


Races depicted in Seitz


Plate from Frederic Moore The Lepidoptera of Ceylon depicting the imago, larva and pupa.


source - Wikipedia