The Environment Ministry said Thursday that a species of small butterfly endemic to Japan's southern islands is feared to have gone extinct because all artificially bred butterflies and worms of its type have died.
In the butterfly's natural habitats, in the Ogasawara Islands some 1,000 km south of Tokyo, no individuals from the species have been confirmed since 2018, the ministry said.
Unless the blue butterfly measuring just over 1 cm long is found in the wild, it will be the first butterfly species native to Japan to go extinct.