Six new butterfly species found in Arunachal's Siang Valley

A team of conservationists believe that the river Brahmaputra played a critical biogeographic role in facilitating their faunal continuity.

Guwahati: Rivers may not be the natural habitats for butterflies. 

A team of conservationists, who documented six new species of butterflies in a community conserved forest village, situated at over 1,300 meters in Arunachal Pradesh's Siang Valley, however, believe that the river Brahmaputra played a critical biogeographic role in facilitating their faunal continuity. 

The new species, Litin Onyx (Horaga takanamii), Narrow-banded Royal (Dacalana vui), Tibetan Duke (Euthalia zhaxidunzhui), Tibetan Sergeant (Athyma yui), Tibetan Junglequeen (Stichophthalma neumogeni renqingduojiei), and Mountain Columbine (Stiboges elodinia) were earlier documented in Laos, Thailand, Vietnam, Myanmar, and southeastern Tibet. This is for the first time, the species have been documented in India. 

"Their sighting  in Arunachal Pradesh significantly extends their known distribution range and strengthens the evidence of biogeographic continuity between the Metok region of Tibet and India’s Siang Valley, both linked by the Yarlung Tsangpo or the Brahmaputra River," said a paper published in the latest issue of Entomon journal. 

“The Brahmaputra river appears to play a critical biogeographic role, facilitating faunal continuity between southeastern Tibet and eastern Arunachal Pradesh," It further said. 

The documentation was carried out by Ashoka Trust for Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment (ATREE), a biodiversity research and conservation organisation based in Bengaluru, and the Litin Community Conservation Society based in Simong village in Upper Siang district in ArunachalPradesh. The butterflies were photographed and identified in the Simung Community Forest in June-July in 2024.

The authors included Monsoon Jyoti Gogoi, Rajkamal Goswami, Seena Narayanan Karimbumkara, and Agur Litin. The fieldwork was carried out as part of ATREE’s Siang Valley Biodiversity Conservation Programme. The expedition was led by local conservationist from Litin clan, Agur Litin, who is also one of the co-author of the paper.

The local Adi and other indigenous communities play a crucial role in conservation through traditional land stewardship practices. But the butterfly species in Siang valley has remained poorly studied, said the report.

"The documentation of six previously unrecorded species within a short one-month survey underscores the striking lack of Lepidopteran surveys and conservation attention in the Indian Eastern Himalayas,” the study said.