A Butterfly from the Conservatory of Niagara Falls

[hectonichus]

May you help me to identifly this butterfly?

Thank you.

[Psyche]

It is Battus polydamas the Gold-rimmed Swallowtail, an American species.

TL Seow

[Psyche]

Oops! It is not Battus polydamas which have red spotted body & more white on the forewing.
This should be the correct one.Battus lycidas..
http://www.google.com.my/imgres?imgu...%3Disch&itbs=1

TL Seow
PS. It is not B. lycidas either as lycidas have a white upper abdomen.
Sorry, I think I have bitten off more than I can chew.
There are too many to compare one by one.

[moloch]

I have looked through the fieldguide to North American butterflies and cannot find a match. As Seow indicated, it resembles Battus polydamas but the body colour is not correct.

I tried an excellent online resource:
http://www.butterfliesofamerica.com/...lionidae_a.htm

Once again, I could find no matches. Maybe this is a central or South American species?


Regards,

[hectonichus]

Thank you!

But ... I have carefully checked in the site you proposed ... what about

Battus laodamas copanae ??

see http://butterfliesofamerica.com/imag...ERTHET_1_i.htm

and

http://butterfliesofamerica.com/imag...DHJ97461_i.htm


Your confirmation or comments is greatly appreciated.

Ciao.

[Psyche]

Thank you!

But ... I have carefully checked in the site you proposed ... what about

Battus laodamas copanae ??

see http://butterfliesofamerica.com/imag...ERTHET_1_i.htm

and

http://butterfliesofamerica.com/imag...DHJ97461_i.htm


Your confirmation or comments is greatly appreciated.

Ciao.

You got it right. A perfect match to the mounted specimen right down to the white spots on the underside of the abdomen.
As you can see the field shot individual looks different enough to be something else.

TL Seow

[hectonichus]

May be I have the solution.

The monted specimen of Battus loadamas copanae

http://butterfliesofamerica.com/imag...DHJ97461_i.htm

comes from the following original site

http://janzen.sas.upenn.edu/Wadults/...otj=DHJ97461.j

where it is named Battus ingenuus - female (the males should have a white dorsal body).

What a mess!!

Awaiting for your kind eventual comments, thanks a lot to everybody.

[Psyche]

What a mess!!

I seem to have gotten deeper into this mess.
The undersides are so alike that it is very confusing.

I think the following can be discounted.
B. polydamas. Body spotted red.
B. eracon. additional pale spots between the red submarginal spots.
B. lycidas. long forewing; usually no white spots.(probably should not have white spots on hindwing)
B. crassus. no white submarginal spots.

This leaves B. laodamas, & B. ingenuus (also considered a ssp. of B. belus.)

I think B. laodamas should only have lunulate red spots, & no white spots. It is possible that the specimens bred by Janzen in Costa Rica have been wrongly captioned after the images were transferred.(original drawings of several laodamas subspecies show no white spots on the hindwing.)
I cannot see any difference between them(Janzen's specimens) and the B. ingenuus specimens on the same site.

I think your image is that of B. ingenuus female.

TL Seow

[hectonichus]

Great!!!! Thanks a lot to everybody!!

[moloch]

I noticed that the B. ingenuus was from Guanacaste Province in Costa Rica. I thought that you might be interested in a few habitat shots of the area where this butterfly lives. In 1980, I spent several months there working on a research project at Rancho Palo Verde along the Tempisque River. This part of Costa Rica is monsoonal and the habitat is known as tropical deciduous forest. Most of the trees loose their leaves at the end of the dry season. I stayed at this reserve in December and January, early in the dry season. The trees still had leaves at the time.





I saw many interesting birds and butterflies during my visit. The marshes were full of waterfall, in particular these Black-bellied Whistling Ducks:



Regards,