Researchers find new butterfly species

Nacaduba sinhala ramaswamii Sadasivan was discovered a decade ago in Agasthyamalais

A group of lepidopterists have added a species to the expanding list of butterflies in India. The discovery of the species Nacaduba sinhala ramaswamii Sadasivan, 2021 in the Agasthyamalais in the Western Ghats a decade ago has now found place in the Journal of Threatened Taxa. The new taxon of Lycaenid butterflies belonging to the Nacaduba genus had been first sighted by a team comprising Kalesh Sadasivan and Baiju K. representing the Travancore Nature History Society, Rahul Khot of the Bombay Natural History Society, and Ramasamy Naicker from Theni. Line Blues are small butterflies belonging to the subfamily Lycaenidae and their distribution ranges from India and Sri Lanka to the whole of southeastern Asia, Australia and Samoa. It is the first time that a butterfly species was discovered by an all-Indian research team from the Western Ghats.