Colotis castalis (Staudinger, 1885)

Liseki, Steven D. & Vane-Wright, Richard I., 2014, Butterflies (Lepidoptera: Papilionoidea) of Mount Kilimanjaro: family Pieridae, subfamily Pierinae, Journal of Natural History 48 (25 - 26), pp. 1543-1583 : 1554

Colotis castalis (Staudinger, 1885)

Larsen 1996: pl. 6, fig. 47i. d’ Abrera 1997: 72 (3 figs). SI: Figure 12e–j.

Forewing length: male 22–26 mm (mean (n = 5) 23.86 mm, SD = 0.913); female 22– 26 mm (mean (n = 5) 24.36 mm, SD = 1.315).

Nazari et al. (2011, p.214) reinstated the Afrotropical taxon castalis , formerly treated as a subspecies of the Indian C. vestalis (Butler, 1867) , as a full species.

Records. Occurs in Tanzania in dry bush and savannah from 1000 to 1800 m, in the Northern Highlands, Ruaha National Park, Mikumi, Ruaha Gorge, eastern foot of Image Mountain and Mpwapwa ( Kielland 1990, p.60), including Taveta ( Rogers 1913, p.98) and Moshi ( Larsen 1996, as vestalis castalis ). The BMNH and OUMNH have many specimens from Taveta; Kilimanjaro is the type locality. Beyond Tanzania this butterfly occurs in Somalia, Ethiopia (south), Sudan and Kenya (Pokot, South Turkana, Garissa, Voi, Tsavo: Larsen 1996, as vestalis castalis ).

Seasonally variable ( Larsen 1996, p.129), females also vary with respect to ground colour which, although generally off-white, can also be yellow, or rarely orange or salmon pink (this last represented by a specimen from Kiboko River, southeastern Tanzania, in the Rothschild Collection , BMNH). We have not seen orange females from the Kilimanjaro district .

GROUP VII