Borbo fatuellus

Borbo fatuellus
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Arthropoda
Class:	Insecta
Order:	Lepidoptera
Family:	Hesperiidae
Genus:	Borbo
Species:	B. fatuellus
Binomial name
Borbo fatuellus (Hopffer, 1855)[1]
Synonyms
Pamphila fatuellus Hopffer, 1855 Pamphila cinerea Holland, 1892 Hesperia caffraria Plötz, 1883 Pamphila dolens Mabille, 1898 Baoris fatuellus thomea Evans, 1937

Borbo fatuellus, the long horned swift, long horned skipper or foolish swift, is a butterfly of the Hesperiidae family. It is found in tropical Africa and south-western Arabia. The habitat consists of wet forests, moist woodland and coastal bush.

The wingspan is 33–42 mm for males and 40–43 mm for females. Adults are on wing year round, but are more common from October to May in southern Africa.^[2]

The larvae feed on Ehrharta erecta, Setaria sulcata, Setaria megaphylla, Imperata cylindrica, Pennisetum, Panicum and Digitaria species.

Subspecies

• Borbo fatuellus fatuellus (Sub-Saharan Africa, including Senegal, Gambia, Guinea-Bissau, Guinea, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Ivory Coast, Ghana, Togo, Nigeria, Cameroon, Bioko, Zambia, Mozambique, Zimbabwe, northern Botswana, northern Namibia, Swaziland, Yemen, South Africa: coastal lowland forests and wooded Savannah from the East Cape to Swaziland and along the coast to northern KwaZulu-Natal, Mpumalanga and the Limpopo Province and the further north)
• Borbo fatuellus dolens (Mabille, 1898) (Comoro Islands)
• Borbo fatuellus thomea (Evans, 1937) (São Tomé and Príncipe)

References

1. Borbo, Site of Markku Savela
2. Woodhall, S. Field Guide to Butterflies of South Africa, Cape Town: Struik Publishers, 2005.