![]() The typical size is in the 2.5" - 4.0" range. See our page that helps to identify common black-colored swallowtails. It is similar to the Pipevine Swallowtail, Spicebush Swallowtail, and Palamedes Swallowtail but wing patterns are somewhat different. It features black wings with rows of yellow spots, separated by blue scaling. It can be seen from the Gulf of Mexico to southern Canada, from the Atlantic seaboard westward to Arizona, Southern California, Colorado, and North Dakota. All photos by Mary Lee Epps.The Eastern Black Swallowtail ( Papilio polyxenes) butterfly is a common visitor to open fields and farmlands, and frequently seen in urban landscapes. This article first appeared in the Fall, 2019 edition of The Declaration, the newsletter of the Jefferson Chapter of VNPS. Peterson Field Guide to Moths, by David Beadle and Seabrooke Leckie, Houghton, Mifflin, Harcourt, 2012.Butterflies through Binoculars: the East, by Jeffrey Glassberg, Oxford University Press, 1999.Wagner, Princeton Field Guides, Princeton University Press, 2005. Caterpillars of Eastern North America, by David L. ![]() Asimina triloba, Digital Atlas of the Virginia Flora.Eurytides Marcellus, by Leticia Davila 2001, Animal Diversity Web.Butler, Entomology and Nematology Department, University of Florida. Featured Creatures: Zebra Swallowtail, by Donald W. ![]() Connections: The Pawpaw Tree and the Zebra Swallowtail Butterfly, by Laura Seale, Blue Ridge Discovery Center.Hormaza, Arnold Arboretum, Harvard University. The Pawpaw, a Forgotten North American Fruit Tree, by Jose I.Layne, Kentucky State University Extension Service. Pawpaw Description and Nutritional Information, by Snake C.Want to know more? Here are my helpful references: ![]() ![]() (My first thought was that this was a way to assure that some eggs escaped predators, but apparently the caterpillars can be cannibalistic so that scattering the eggs helps protect the caterpillars from each other.) Instead it lay only one egg on a given leaf. She soon realized that the butterfly was laying eggs on the newly emerging leaves, but it didn’t simply choose a likely leaf and deposit a mass of eggs. In mid-April a couple of years ago my daughter, Mary Jane, who spends a great deal of time in the woods observing nature, was watching a zebra swallowtail butterfly flitting about a pawpaw tree that was just leafing out. Zebra swallowtail caterpillars, by ingesting these compounds, make themselves unpalatable to many predators. If you see a zebra swallowtail around our part of Virginia, you can be sure that there are pawpaws nearby.Ĭompounds called acetogenins in the leaves and leaf twigs are repellent to most insects, birds and browsing mammals. In the Deep South there are a few other species of Asimina that can host the caterpillar but in most of Virginia and in states farther north, Asimina triloba is the only host. The zebra swallowtail is beautiful with dramatic black and white stripes enhanced by long swallowtails and touches of red. One of the most attractive features of pawpaw is that it is host plant to the caterpillar of the zebra swallowtail butterfly ( Protographium marcellus, formerly Eurytides marcellus). Zebra Swallowtail Newly Emerged from Chrysalis ![]()
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