22 May 2016

Dark Grass Blue Butterfly near Riyadh – Record by Mansur Al Fahad

Mansur Al Fahad took a few macro photographs of some Dark Grass Blue Zizeeria karsandra. They were photographed at Heet village south of Riyadh in May. The area has some farms and semi-desert land and these butterflies are plentiful this year, as the good rains have helped the emergence of good vegetarian cover. Dark Grass Blue is a small butterfly found in the Southern Mediterranean, in a broad band to India, Sri Lanka, the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Burma, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines, New Guinea and northern and eastern Australia. It belongs to the Lycaenids or Blues family. As the common name suggests, this species is found in open grassy habitats but can occur anywhere where grasses occur such as the area where Mansur photographed it. I thank Mansur for sending me the details, identification and permission to use them on my website.
Dark Grass Blue

Dark Grass Blue