Eastern Tiger Swallowtail

by Christopher James

Title

Eastern Tiger Swallowtail

Artist

Christopher James

Medium

Photograph - Photography

Description

The eastern black swallowtail is one of our most common and most studied swallowtails. Although it is admired for its beauty, it is one of the very few butterflies that may occasionally be considered a pest. It has been known by a variety of other names including black swallowtail, American swallowtail, parsnip swallowtail, parsley swallowtail, celeryworm, and caraway worm (Miller 1992). Several subspecies of Papilio polyxenes that occur in Mexico, Central America and South America (Minno & Emmel 1993). Only the subspecies asterius will be covered here and, for simplicity, will be referred to as the black swallowtail even though technically the name "black swallowtail" also includes the other subspecies.
The adult wing spread range is 6.9–8.4 cm (Minno & Minno 1999) with females typically larger than males. The upper surfaces of the wings display sexual dimorphism. The upper surface of the wings is black with two rows of yellow spots—large and bright in males and smaller and lighter in females. The area between the rows of spots on the hind wings of females is powdery iridescent blue. The blue area in males is much less prominent. There is a conspicuous red spot with a black bulls-eye on the inner hind margin of the hind wings and an isolated yellow spot on the costa of the front wings.

The under sides of wings of males and females are virtually identical. The front wings have two rows of pale yellow spots. Hind wings have rows of bright orange spots separated by areas of powdery blue.
I have slowly been changing my garden habitat to encourage butterflies, bees and eventually hopefully hummingbirds.

Uploaded

June 18th, 2018

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