Publ. 30. IV. 1915. 
LIPHYRINAE; General Topics. By Dr. A. Seitz. 
801 
on the Spirifex Steppes, the Lycaenidae were often the only common insects, but they were not touched by 
the numerous swallows tearing along through the fields. 
This explains the scheme of colouring and marking characteristic of almost all the Lycaenid genera: 
a radiant or glaring inner surface making the animal conspicuous in active life, and an inconspicuous, frequently 
adapted under surface for hiding while at rest. Many Lycaenidae are in the habit of gathering on bushes where 
they rest in such a way that the bush seems to be in blossom. In small species, the eye-spots on the under 
surface may then look like stamina. 
Very many Lycaenidae, as has already been mentioned above, occur at their swarming-places in greater 
numbers of specimens than most of the other day-butterflies do, but there are also districts where the Lycaenidae 
are remarkably rare. I remember of having seen in America landscapes of the most exuberant vegetation, 
where this family of butterflies was almost entirely absent. 
The eggs are shaped like a cake, i. e. above flattened hemispheres mostly very abundantly costate 
or reticular, lying on the food-plant with their broad surface. They are nearly always singly deposited, gene¬ 
rally on the under surface of the leaves or twigs. 
The larvae, as a rule, are of a compact, hunched shape greatly tapering off in front and behind (woodlice- 
larvae), but they are distinguished by the upper surface being sometimes flat, sometimes bristly or covered 
with fluff. Some are decidedly knob-shaped, similar to a large shield-louse, and this is the case in a most 
conspicuous way in such species that are, as the Liphyra- larvae, suspected of feeding from insects. At any 
rate, however, when at rest, the head is entirely drawn back under the shield of the first segments and only 
in creeping or feeding it becomes visible. 
The peculiar, glandular organ found in many (particularly American) Erycinid larvae at the sides of 
the neck, has not become known to me in Lycaenid larvae; it may even be regarded as a good mark of distinc¬ 
tion for these two groups, since the Erycinid larvae often also have a shape like a wood-louse. In the Lycaenid 
larva, however, we find a different kind of organs. The most curious organ is presumably a retractile fan at 
the sides near the anal end of the larva of Cmetis, which may be set into very swift motion. Likewise 
near the anal end is the ant-organ, a secerning gland to be turned back on being touched by the ant’s antenna. 
It is ascertained in very numerous, ants-loving Lycaenidae from Europe, India and Africa, and especially 
Lamborn, Chapman and others have recently bestowed close attention to the symbiosis of these animals. 
Kershaw has described the life-history of Gerydus the larva of which lives in colonies of aphis, together with 
ants, and feeds on aphis. Regarding the symbiosis of Azanus ubaldus we refer to Vol. I of the ,,Macrolepidoptera“ 
p. 294; here a regular escorting of the larva by the ants’ guard takes place. The value of this escorting, which 
was not conceived as long as the chief enemies of the butterflies and larvae were supposed to be among the birds, 
is now highly estimated, since one knows that spiders, hawk-flies, particularly Hemiptera heteroptera, such 
as Nabis, Pentatoma, Reduviids etc. become especially perilous to the larvae. 
The pupae of the Lycaenidae are mostly short and squat and sometimes look like the buds of leaves. They 
are as a rule fastened on the base by means of a silky pad at the cremaster and of a belt round the middle 
of the body, lying broadly on it with the mostly flat ventral side. But there also occur enough species the 
pupae of which rest unprotected and freely on the soil. In African and Indian species it remains partly sticking 
fast in the old larval skin which acts protectively like a screen, and other species again are the guests of ants 
until their development into a butterfly. 
The classification of the Lycaenidae in subdivisions has been attempted according to different principles. 
Rober (in Staudinger und Schatz, Exot. Tagfalter) has distinguised two principal groups: Lipteninae (forewings 
nearly always with 12 veins, only African), and Lycaeninae (forewings nearly always with only 11 or 10 veins). 
To the latter group belong all the species of the Indo-Australian fauna. Further details as to the differences 
of these groups see Vol. XIII, p. 297. 
1. Subfamily: Liphyrinae. 
This group so greatly deviates from all the other Lycaenidae, that we deal with it separately. Only 
1 or 2 species form the only genus belonging here, for which reason the diagnosis of it stated below is also 
that of the subfamily. The yellowish-brown ground-colour being quite uncommon in Indo-Australian Lycaena, 
the uncommonly clumsy body, and the Heterocera-\ike flight sufficiently characterize the species belonging here. 
Still more curious, however, are the larvae which themselves already justify the separation and elimination 
from the other Lycaenidae. But we cannot decide for the present, whether the reduced exterior proves this 
insect to be indeed the most primitiveLycaenid, or whether rather regressive processes have stunted the animal 
having been originally better developed; in favour of the latter presumption would be an observation according 
to which it is a semi-parasitic animal. Parasitism is always followed by stunted growth, and the deviating, 
clumsy larva with its stunted extremities is perhaps only the result of the abandonment of a formerly indepen¬ 
dant existence. 
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