Charaxes (Eriboea) jahlusa kenyensis Joicey and Talbot, 1925

Liseki, Steven D. & Vane-Wright, Richard I., 2015, Butterflies (Lepidoptera: Papilionoidea) of Mount Kilimanjaro: Nymphalidae subfamilies Libytheinae, Danainae, Satyrinae and Charaxinae, Journal of Natural History 50, pp. 865-904 : 883

Charaxes (Eriboea) jahlusa kenyensis Joicey and Talbot, 1925

Henning 1989: 236 (4 figs). Larsen 1996: pl. 36, fig. 479 i,ii. d ’ Abrera 2004: 453 (3 figs). SI: Figure 16e – h.

Forewing length: male 22 – 26 mm [mean (n = 4) 23.68 mm, SD = 1.231]; female 28 – 34 mm [mean (n = 5) 30.26 mm, SD = 1.731]. van Someren (1974, p. 421) gave male forewing length as 28 – 30 mm, female as 32 – 35 mm, both apparently larger than the small sample we have measured.

Records

Kielland (1990, p. 104) recorded subsp. kenyensis from Ukerewe Island (Lake Victoria), the Pare Mountains, the Usambaras, and Pemba, at altitudes up to 1500 m, describing it as ‘ uncommon and local ’. Henning (1989) gives no specific records for Kilimanjaro, and there is no Kilimanjaro material of this taxon in OUMNH. However, van Someren (1975, p. 425) lists ‘ Taveta-Kilimanjaro area ’ as part of its range – and on this basis, together with a male from New Moshi and another from Taveta in BMNH (where they have been placed, perhaps incorrectly, as the more southerly Charaxes j. argynnides Westwood), we include C. j. kenyensis as an element of the lower slopes fauna. There must be significant doubt, however, regarding the subspecies assignment (including the issue of size, as noted above). Beyond Tanzania, subsp. kenyensis is restricted to Kenya, where it occurs up to the Somalian border, with transitional forms in northwestern Kenya and eastern Uganda. Divided into eight races, C. jahlusa (Trimen, 1862) is an east African insect, found from Somalia to South Africa ( Ackery et al. 1995, p. 446).