The Blue Tiger (Tirumala limniace) is a butterfly found in India that belongs to the crows and tigers, that is, the danaid group of the brush-footed butterfly family. This butterfly shows gregarious migratory behaviour in southern India.
Description:
Upperside black, with bluish-white semihyaline spots and streaks. Fore wing: interspace 1 two streaks, sometimes coalescent, with a spot beyond cell: a streak from base and an outwardly indented spot at its apex; a large oval spot at base of interspace 2, another at base of interspace 3, with a smaller spot beyond it towards termen; five obliquely placed preapical streaks, and somewhat irregular subterminal and terminal series of spots, the latter the smaller. Hind wing: interspaces 1b, 1a, and 1 with streaks from base, double in the latter two, cell with a forked broad streak, the lower branch with a hook, or spur-like slender loop, at base of 4 and 5 a broad elongate streak, and at base of 6 a quadrate spot; beyond these again a number of scattered unequal subterminal and terminal spots.
Larva:
Yellowish white; 3rd and 12th segments, each with a pair of fleshy filaments, black and greenish white; each of the segments with four transverse black bars, the second bar on all broader than the others, bifurcated laterally, a yellow longitudinal line on each side; head, feet and claspers spotted with black. The larva is around 1.21 centimetres (0.48 in) in length and weighs around 5 milligrams (0.077 gr) initially, but grows double that size and four times that weight within 48 hours.
Range:
South Asia and Southeast Asia. Also found in numbers in Queensland (at least as far south as Mackay, but also recorded in Brisbane) Australia.
Photo shot by Ahalya P G
