Skippers, Hesperiidae, are a large group of Butterflies named for their quick darting flights. They are global in distribution, but reach their maximum diversity in the tropical regions of Central and South America.
In a paper published in the journal Tropical Lepidoptera Reasearch on 31 May 2018, Fabian Gaviria, Ricardo Siewert, Olaf Mielke, and Mirna Casagrande of the Laboratório de Estudos de Lepidoptera Neotropical at the Universidade Federal do Paraná, describe a new species of Skipper from the Darién National Park in Panama.
The new species is placed in the genus Psoralis, which currently contains 12 species from South America, and given the specific name darienensis, meaning 'from Darién'. The species is described from two male specimens collected from an abandoned mine site within the Darién National Park, at an altitude of about 1500 m above sealevel. These are brown in colour with yellow and black markings and a forewing length of 19 mm.
Psoralis darienensis. Male from Darién National Park, Darién Province, Panama, dorsal (a) and ventral (b) views. Gaviria et al. (2018).
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