Borbo fatuellus, the long horned swift, long horned skipper or foolish swift, is a butterfly of the family Hesperiidae. It is found in tropical Africa and south-western Arabia. The habitat consists of wet forests, moist woodland and coastal bush.
The wingspan is 33âÂÂ42 mm for males and 40âÂÂ43 mm for females. Adults are on wing year-round, but are more common from October to May in southern Africa.
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, Yemen, South Africa: coastal lowland forests and wooded Savannah from the Eastern Cape to Eswatini and along the coast to northern KwaZulu-Natal, Mpumalanga and the Limpopo Province and the further north)
- Borbo fatuellus dolens <small>(Mabille, 1898)</small> (Comoro Islands)
- Borbo fatuellus thomea <small>(Evans, 1937)</small> (São Tomé and PrÃÂncipe)
References