Atrytonopsis loammi, the Loammi skipper or southern dusted skipper, is a butterfly of the family Hesperiidae. It is found in the United States on barrier islands in North Carolina and from South Carolina to Florida and Mississippi.

Atrytonopsis loammi
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Arthropoda
Class: Insecta
Order: Lepidoptera
Family: Hesperiidae
Genus: Atrytonopsis
Species:
A. loammi
Binomial name
Atrytonopsis loammi
(Whitney, 1876)
Synonyms
  • Atrytonopsis regulus (Edwards, 1881)
  • Atrytonopsis apostologica (Strand, 1921)
  • Lerema loammi

Some authors consider it to be a subspecies of Atrytonopsis hianna. The North Carolina population has been described as a new species, Atrytonopsis quinteri, though the paper describing it does not discuss how the new species differs from the Florida populations of A. loammi.[1]

The wingspan is about 32 mm. Adults are on wing from early April to mid-May and mid-July to late August.

The larvae feed on Schizachyrium littorale.

References

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  1. ^ Burns 2015

Burns, J. 2015. Speciation in an insular sand dune habitat: Atrytonopsis (Hesperiidae: Hesperiinae) - mainly from the southwestern United States and Mexico - off the Carolina coast. Journal of the Lepidopterists' Society 69(4):275-292. [1]

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