Critically Endangered
Erikssonia edgei
Erikssonia edgei
Erikssonia edgei, called the Waterberg copper, tilodi copper or Edge's acraea copper, is an obligate myrmecophilous lycaenid butterfly, that is native to Limpopo, South Africa.
The gossamer-winged butterfly
The forewing length is 12.3-16.8 mm for males and 16.1–19.1 mm for females.
Range and habitat
Erikssonia edgei, called the Waterberg copper, tilodi copper or Edge's acraea copper, is an obligate myrmecophilous lycaenid butterfly, that is native to Limpopo, South Africa. The critically endangered butterfly occurs in high-altitude grasslands on sandy substrates, and has only been obtained from the type and one subsequent locality.
The status of two populations, discovered in 2013 at a private nature reserve to the southeast, remains indeterminate. As of 2017, it status is indeterminate as its continued presence at Bateleur Nature Reserve has not been confirmed.
Pins are Wikidata “endemic to” fields. Orange dots, when present, are GBIF occurrence tiles — survey bias included.
Diet
The adult is what most collections hold. The larva — the feeding stage — is often undescribed for the rarest names.
Life history follows the order: complete metamorphosis in moths and beetles, nymphs in grasshoppers and bugs. This page does not invent a host plant that no source named.
In crisis
The population at the type locality, a farm in the Waterberg, went extinct about 12 years after its 1980 discovery. It was afforded species status in 2010, when no extant populations were known. It has only been found in Limpopo, South Africa, and was originally deemed to be a southern population of E. Acraeina.
No specimens were obtained in the years 1993 to 2012, and the southern population was feared extinct.
Named moths and butterflies with a high threat category are often known from a small range and a thin series. Host-plant loss leaves little to recount.
Erikssonia edgei is Critically Endangered on this catalog because that is the IUCN category stored on Wikidata. Confirm the official criteria and any later count on iucnredlist.org.
Sources
Written for this catalog from the English Wikipedia article on Erikssonia edgei, Wikidata item Q5389064. Family and order context is original field-guide writing about the group, not a copied assessment of this one species. Wikipedia text is CC BY-SA. Not an IUCN assessment. Counts, when quoted, can change — confirm them on the recovery programme and on iucnredlist.org.
