''Tanaecia lepidea'', the grey count, is a species of

nymphalid The Nymphalidae are the largest family of butterflies, with more than 6,000 species distributed throughout most of the world. Belonging to the superfamily Papilionoidea, they are usually medium-sized to large butterflies. Most species have a red ...

butterfly Butterflies are insects in the macrolepidopteran clade Rhopalocera from the Order (biology), order Lepidoptera, which also includes moths. Adult butterflies have large, often brightly coloured wings, and conspicuous, fluttering flight. The ...

found in

South South is one of the cardinal directions or Points of the compass, compass points. The direction is the opposite of north and is perpendicular to both east and west. Etymology The word ''south'' comes from Old English ''sūþ'', from earlier Pro ...

and

Southeast Asia Southeast Asia, also spelled South East Asia and South-East Asia, and also known as Southeastern Asia, South-eastern Asia or SEA, is the geographical United Nations geoscheme for Asia#South-eastern Asia, south-eastern region of Asia, consistin ...

Description

Upperside dark brown, paler in the female, with very obscure black markings of transverse lines across the cells of both forewings and hindwings and an oblique discal fascia on the forewing; an ash-grey continuous band along the termen of both forewings and hindwings, gradually broadening from the apex of the forewing, where it is very narrow, to the tornus of the hindwing, where it covers about one-third of the wing. In the female this band is outwardly narrowly bordered with brown. Cilia white. Antennae, head, thorax and abdomen dark brown above; beneath, the antennae ochraceous, the rest dusky white washed with ochraceous. Underside: Male ochraceous brown, female bright ochraceous. In both sexes the colours paler on the hindwing; the forewing somewhat narrowly, the hindwing much more broadly suffused with lilacine-grey on the terminal margins and along the dorsal margin of the hindwing; cells of both wings with dark brown sinuous transverse lines and looplike markings; both forewings and hindwings crossed by somewhat diffuse broad discal and narrower postdiscal dark bands, prominent on the forewing, obscure on the hindwing. Male with a patch of specialized dark scales above vein 4 on the upperside of the hindwing.

Distribution

Found in the lower

Himalayas The Himalayas, or Himalaya (; ; ), is a mountain range in Asia, separating the plains of the Indian subcontinent from the Tibetan Plateau. The range has some of the planet's highest peaks, including the very highest, Mount Everest. Over 100 ...

eastwards from

Almora Almora ( Kumaoni: ''Almāḍ'') is a municipal board and a cantonment town in the state of Uttarakhand, India. It is the administrative headquarters of Almora district. Almora is located on a ridge at the southern edge of the Kumaon Hills of the ...

. In the Western Ghats, central India,

Orissa Odisha (English: , ), formerly Orissa ( the official name until 2011), is an Indian state located in Eastern India. It is the 8th largest state by area, and the 11th largest by population. The state has the third largest population of Sch ...

Bengal Bengal ( ; bn, বাংলা/বঙ্গ, translit=Bānglā/Bôngô, ) is a geopolitical, cultural and historical region in South Asia, specifically in the eastern part of the Indian subcontinent at the apex of the Bay of Bengal, predom ...

and into

Assam Assam (; ) is a state in northeastern India, south of the eastern Himalayas along the Brahmaputra and Barak River valleys. Assam covers an area of . The state is bordered by Bhutan and Arunachal Pradesh to the north; Nagaland and Manipur ...

and the

Malay Peninsula The Malay Peninsula (Malay: ''Semenanjung Tanah Melayu'') is a peninsula in Mainland Southeast Asia. The landmass runs approximately north–south, and at its terminus, it is the southernmost point of the Asian continental mainland. The area ...

. Found in forested habitats.

Life history

Larva. "Of the usual ''Euthalia'' form; colour green with a dorsal row of light red ocelli with blue centres; spines tipped with yellow." (Davidson & Aitken.) Pupa. "More narrowed at the head than ''E. garuda'', green, all the points golden tipped with black, and a few large spots of gold between." (Davidson & Aitken) Food plants include ''

Melastoma malabathricum ''Melastoma malabathricum'', known also as Malabar melastome, Indian rhododendron, Singapore rhododendron, planter's rhododendron and senduduk, is a flowering plant in the family Melastomataceae. This plant is native to Indomalaya, Japan and Aust ...

'' and ''

Planchonia careya ''Planchonia careya'' is a tree species in the family Lecythidaceae. Common names include cocky apple, cockatoo apple and billygoat plum. The species should not be confused with ''Terminalia ferdinandiana'', with which it shares some common na ...

''.Gaden S. Robinson, Phillip R. Ackery, Ian J. Kitching, George W. Beccaloni and Luis M. Hernández HOSTS - a Database of the World's Lepidopteran Hostplants

Accessed October 2006 Grey Count (Tanaecia lepidea) caterpillar on Careya arborea W IMG 2387.jpg, caterpillar on ''

Careya arborea ''Careya arborea'' is a species of tree in the Lecythidaceae family, native to the Indian subcontinent, Afghanistan, and Indochina. Its common English names include wild guava, Ceylon oak, patana oak. ''Careya arborea'' is a deciduous tree that g ...

'' Image:Grey_count_wynaad.jpg, Basking on sunlit leaves Grey count (Tanaecia lepidea lepidea) Pokhara.jpg, ''T. l. lepidea'',

Nepal Nepal (; ne, नेपाल ), formerly the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal ( ne, सङ्घीय लोकतान्त्रिक गणतन्त्र नेपाल ), is a landlocked country in South Asia. It is mai ...

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q3595625 Tanaecia Butterflies described in 1868 Butterflies of Asia Taxa named by Arthur Gardiner Butler