Matskási István (szerk.): A Magyar Természettudományi Múzeum évkönyve 93. (Budapest 2001)
Bálint, Zs. ; Benyamini, D.: Taxonomic notes, faunistics and species descriptions of the austral South American polyommatine lycaenid genus Pseudolucia (Lepidoptera: Lycaenidae): the chilensis and collina species-groups
On 11 .XII. 1999 the junior author returned to the coastal dunes 3.7 km North of Huasco. A second, continuously dry, winter did not help the condition of foodplants, which were green and blossoming only at their extremities with their bases black and dry. During this period, probably near the end of the second generation, more female of P. oraria were observed - usually sitting motionless with close wings on the sand or on dry fallen stems. One female was sipping nectar from a white flower of the dominant prostrate Tiquila plants. Sometimes, alighting females made a quarter turn and opened their wings slightly, or up to 45 degrees. Only once did a female moved its opened hind wings. All five females and three males observed were flying over the eastern (downwind) slope of the dunes. North of Huasco 35 km, the foodplants were in far better condition but only seven males of P. oraria were observed. They were competing for perch sites with many wasps and flies and, proving quite inferior, could hardly get close to the Chorizanthe stems. On several occasions when the males succeeded in landing or began to hover over the foodplants, they were attacked by flies and disappeared rapidly, giving the flies and the entomologist no chance to catch or pursue them. This tactic of rapid disappearance possibly keeps their survival rate higher. When males landed, they did so with closed wings and always rubbing their hindwings together. During one and a half hour of wandering the dunes not a single female was observed. At a dune area 3.7 km North of Huasco, 28 eggs were found, all laid on foodplant calyxes. The tiny white eggs are ± 0.45 mm in diameter. A young larva hatched five days after its egg was found and immediately entered the calyx from the side where it could feed protected from numerous small spiders which were also observed on the foodplants. An L 3 larva was observed on a calyx sitting head down. It was smooth and cryptic, having the same light-green colour as the plant. This larva was 2.5 mm long, relatively flat but widening to the anterior and showed a Dorsal Nectar Organ ("DNO"). A somewhat larger, 3.0 mm long, larva was lighter green with a dorsal line of green, bordered by white trapezial markings. A fully grown, 5.5 mm, long larva was found feeding on the flowers. Its colour was light green with light lateral lines and a dorsal yellowish band; the head was light brown. The DNO was marked by a thin dark line in the shape of a parallelogram. Some mature larvae were red or pink with lateral white lines and subdorsal oblique dashes creating a zig-zag line on each side. The prepupa, situated upside down, is 4.5 to 5.0 mm long, brown, with a dorsal reddish band bordered by light margins. The head appears to invaginate into the body. The fresh pupa had a light green head, brown thorax, greenish-brown wing cases and a dorsal red trapezial marking over its 4.0 mm long abdomen. From this pupa an adult male hatched after eleven days.
