''Pseudonacaduba sichela'', the African line blue, dusky line blue or dusky blue, is a

butterfly Butterflies are insects in the macrolepidopteran clade Rhopalocera from the order Lepidoptera, which also includes moths. Adult butterflies have large, often brightly coloured wings, and conspicuous, fluttering flight. The group comprises ...

of the family

Lycaenidae Lycaenidae is the second-largest family of butterflies (behind Nymphalidae, brush-footed butterflies), with over 6,000 species worldwide, whose members are also called gossamer-winged butterflies. They constitute about 30% of the known butterfly ...

. It is found in

Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...

, south of the

Sahara , photo = Sahara real color.jpg , photo_caption = The Sahara taken by Apollo 17 astronauts, 1972 , map = , map_image = , location = , country = , country1 = , ...

. The

wingspan The wingspan (or just span) of a bird or an airplane is the distance from one wingtip to the other wingtip. For example, the Boeing 777–200 has a wingspan of , and a wandering albatross (''Diomedea exulans'') caught in 1965 had a wingspan ...

is 25–28 mm for males and 25–27 mm for females. Adults are on wing from October to May. The larvae probably feed on ''

Mundulea sericea ''Mundulea sericea'', the cork bush, is an attractive shrub or small tree which is found in relatively open woodlands of Africa and South Asia. It is the only member of the genus with a range extending beyond Madagascar, and it resembles some Afri ...

''.

Subspecies

*''Pseudonacaduba sichela sichela'' (Africa, south of the Sahara) *''Pseudonacaduba sichela reticulum'' (Mabille, 1877) (Madagascar and Mauritius)

References

Butterflies described in 1857 Polyommatini {{Polyommatini-stub