A pair of Papilio agenor thunbergii from Tokyo

[Leonard187]

A pair of Papilio agenor thunbergii. Of course this ssp. formerly belonging to Papilio memnon. They were purchased from Ome-Shi, Tokyo. On the label, it signed Kasumi, so I think they must be fed by a Japanese people in Tokyo but not wild-caught.
Picture 1-2, female, a male-like tailess individual. May I know the form name? Furthermore, I never seen tailed one of this ssp., so the tailed is very rare, or there is no tailed form reported so far?
Picture 3-4, male, very ordinary individual.

Papilio agnor thunbergii F uns.png (751.48 KiB) Viewed 2636 times

Papilio agnor thunbergii F ups.png (621.74 KiB) Viewed 2636 times

[Leonard187]

Picture 3-4, male, very ordinary individual.

Papilio agnor thunbergii M ups.png (545.42 KiB) Viewed 2635 times

Papilio agnor thunbergii M uns.png (563.09 KiB) Viewed 2635 times

[adamcotton]

I edited the subject and post to correct the species name from 'agnor' to agenor.

These probably come from Kyushu island. The species has been moving gradually northwards recently, but as far as I know has not reached Tokyo yet. There is a shrine called Kasumi in Kyushu, so maybe they come from around there.

There is only one female phenotype in this subspecies, as there are no models, and I have never heard of a tailed form. There is a very white form of the female in Ishigaki (Yaeyama Is.).

Adam.

[Leonard187]

I edited the subject and post to correct the species name from 'agnor' to agenor.

These probably come from Kyushu island. The species has been moving gradually northwards recently, but as far as I know has not reached Tokyo yet. There is a shrine called Kasumi in Kyushu, so maybe they come from around there.

There is only one female phenotype in this subspecies, as there are no models, and I have never heard of a tailed form. There is a very white form of the female in Ishigaki (Yaeyama Is.).

Adam.

Sorry for my mistake and thank you for you reply. If there is only one phenotype in this subspecies, what is the relationship between male-like and white individuals? They are the same form with different color just like Papilio agenor agenor f.achates?

[benihikage92]

They reached Tokyo about 20 years ago. You can see them in parks in central Tokyo, although they are not as common as P. xuthus or P. protenor. They are not tailed in Japan, but tailed females are caught on Amami Oshima Island, Okinawa Island, and in other places from time to time. As Adam says, females on islands in Okinawa, Amami, and Yaeyama are quite white, particularly so on Iriomote Island in Yaeyama. But the Iriomote population seems to be extinct now.

Kuni

[adamcotton]

Kuni,

Thanks for the update about agenor reaching Tokyo. I had forgotten about a paper in my folders of publications which I just checked again (Yoshio & Ishii 2004. Trans. lepid. Soc Japan, 55(4): 301-306) which reported it from Kanagawa and Shizuoka, so it has indeed been around Tokyo for about 20 years. This paper includes an interesting map showing the gradual northward movement between 1940 and 2003. I wonder how much further north it will eventually reach.

Leonard187,

Kato, 1933 (Three Colour illustr. Insects Japan, (6): [4], pl 4, f) named the tailed form from Japan as 'esaki-nakaharai', which should be written as esakinakaharai. I haven't seen this book, so don't know exactly where it was described from.

Note that f. achates belongs to Papilio memnon memnon from Java, not P. agenor, and is yellow rather than red. The tailed forms of P. agenor agenor are called alcanor Cramer, 1777 and distantianus Rothschild, 1895. In alcanor the hindwing discal and postdiscal spots are smaller than in distantianus, but they are otherwise similar.

Adam.

[Leonard187]

They reached Tokyo about 20 years ago. You can see them in parks in central Tokyo, although they are not as common as P. xuthus or P. protenor. They are not tailed in Japan, but tailed females are caught on Amami Oshima Island, Okinawa Island, and in other places from time to time. As Adam says, females on islands in Okinawa, Amami, and Yaeyama are quite white, particularly so on Iriomote Island in Yaeyama. But the Iriomote population seems to be extinct now.

Kuni

Thanks for your kind reply, and I get new knowledge from you and Adam ^0^. I regret that the Iriomote population seems to be extinct. Hope some updated record about it just like Papilio elephenor from Assam one day.

[Leonard187]

Kuni,

Thanks for the update about agenor reaching Tokyo. I had forgotten about a paper in my folders of publications which I just checked again (Yoshio & Ishii 2004. Trans. lepid. Soc Japan, 55(4): 301-306) which reported it from Kanagawa and Shizuoka, so it has indeed been around Tokyo for about 20 years. This paper includes an interesting map showing the gradual northward movement between 1940 and 2003. I wonder how much further north it will eventually reach.

Leonard187,

Kato, 1933 (Three Colour illustr. Insects Japan, (6): [4], pl 4, f) named the tailed form from Japan as 'esaki-nakaharai', which should be written as esakinakaharai. I haven't seen this book, so don't know exactly where it was described from.

Note that f. achates belongs to Papilio memnon memnon from Java, not P. agenor, and is yellow rather than red. The tailed forms of P. agenor agenor are called alcanor Cramer, 1777 and distantianus Rothschild, 1895. In alcanor the hindwing discal and postdiscal spots are smaller than in distantianus, but they are otherwise similar.

Adam.

Thank you for your correction, Adam. About form name, I have seen some words with hyphen in it (form of memnon or agenor), such as distantianus-esperi, cream-distantinus, etc. I thought that might be individual with intermediate phenotype between two form, so I was wrong maybe. Do you have any pictures of this form? Thank you.

[adamcotton]

Thank you for your correction, Adam. About form name, I have seen some words with hyphen in it (form of memnon or agenor), such as distantianus-esperi, cream-distantinus, etc. I thought that might be individual with intermediate phenotype between two form, so I was wrong maybe. Do you have any pictures of this form? Thank you.

Yes, a hyphen between two form names indicates that the specimen has characters of both forms, in the case of 'distantianus-esperi' for example, this would be a tailed form with an oblique white subapical band across the forewing. Such specimens are rare, because the genes for each form are closely combined on the chromosome, so it is very unusual for a combination of different forms to occur.

On the other hand 'cream-distantianus' is a single form but the ground colour is cream. Personally I would not include a hyphen.

In the case of a described scientific name, such as esakinakaharai, if it originally included a hyphen it must be removed, except for certain specific exceptions as in this ICZN Code article:
32.5.2.4.3. If the first element is a Latin letter used to denote descriptively a character of the
taxon, it must be retained and connected to the remainder of the name by a hyphen.
Example. c-album, in Polygonia c-album, so named because a white mark on the wing of the butterfly
is similar to the letter c.
In all other cases the hyphen must be removed from a single name.

Sorry, I don't have any photos of the tailed form from southern Japan. There is one pictured in Nakatani & Kobayashi, 1962 (A record of the tailed female of Papilio memnon from Japan. Trans. lepid. Soc Japan, 13(2): 28-29). A black and white version can be downloaded by searching for the paper on https://cir.nii.ac.jp/?lang=en

Adam.

[Leonard187]

Yes, a hyphen between two form names indicates that the specimen has characters of both forms, in the case of 'distantianus-esperi' for example, this would be a tailed form with an oblique white subapical band across the forewing. Such specimens are rare, because the genes for each form are closely combined on the chromosome, so it is very unusual for a combination of different forms to occur.
On the other hand 'cream-distantianus' is a single form but the ground colour is cream. Personally I would not include a hyphen.
In the case of a described scientific name, such as esakinakaharai, if it originally included a hyphen it must be removed, except for certain specific exceptions as in this ICZN Code article:
32.5.2.4.3. If the first element is a Latin letter used to denote descriptively a character of the
taxon, it must be retained and connected to the remainder of the name by a hyphen.
Example. c-album, in Polygonia c-album, so named because a white mark on the wing of the butterfly
is similar to the letter c.
In all other cases the hyphen must be removed from a single name.
Sorry, I don't have any photos of the tailed form from southern Japan. There is one pictured in Nakatani & Kobayashi, 1962 (A record of the tailed female of Papilio memnon from Japan. Trans. lepid. Soc Japan, 13(2): 28-29). A black and white version can be downloaded by searching for the paper on https://cir.nii.ac.jp/?lang=en

Adam.

Thanks Adam. I found this paper and saw the pic. I cannot understand Japanese language quite well and just 'guess' its meaning >0<. In this paper, the author use esaki-nakaharai with a hyphen, so that is not correct.

[adamcotton]

Glad to hear that you could find the paper easily and saw the photo.

Indeed, the hyphen should be removed in this case.

Adam.