Lepidoptera Lovers: Butterfly Kisses

[beautress]

Iris sp.

Astro Blue Iris,
Salem, Oregon nursery
I'm in love with this one. *sigh*

 

[beautress]

Oye beauty.
Go buy 3 of these
Hamelia patens

Thanks, It's real pretty.

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[badger2]

Hamelia patens butterfly video:


Thanks for the grasses photos. They are less well-known as lepidoptera host plants.

 

[beautress]

Hamelia patens butterfly video:


Thanks for the grasses photos. They are less well-known as lepidoptera host plants.

Glad you liked them. I've noticed the agricultural schools around here are VERY interested in plants that affect cattle. A lot of farmers here do cattle as a brings-home-the-bread effort and raise just enough to pay the bills. The gardens are their free food. Lots of them can't afford the meat their cattle sell for in stores, so there's a lot of chicken and dumplings aroma around the farmhouses nearby. I don't care what I read about how good farmers have it with government grants. That isn't true for those who inherited land that was split between several children after the family's last surviving spouse's funeral. The splits of a square mile might be 200 acres, then the kids after that get 67 acres apiece, which keeps them in as much poverty as generations ago were. It gives meaning to Slim Pickens' stage name.

Wow, that video of the Hamelia patens was teeming with life. I thought I saw a hummingbird, but the second sighting it looked more like a butterfly trying to look like a hummingbird. I am particularly fond of the yellow butterflies--aka Giant Sulphurs. Funny name for a butterfly 4" across. But the little sulphurs can be barely visible at under 1" wingspan. Thanks!

 

[beautress]

Oye beauty.
Go buy 3 of these
Hamelia patens

A special thanks for posting the Hamelia patens, Likkmee. After seeing yours' and badger2's posts, I'm tempted to go to the nursery and find that pretty - nectar plant. Grandma Shurtleff had one that was like that except a pioneer honeysuckle bush in her yard, and boy did the bees buzz around it, mainly. I wasn't really crazy about Lepidoptera until I moved back to Texas in 2009. I almost flipped out when I saw how they adored this property I live on, and their colors and kinds were all over the map. I started buying butterfly books, refound the Cockrell Butterfly Center after visiting it no telling how many years ago when I returned to Houston to visit family one year. It was in a makeshift large greenhouse covered with plastic stuff back then, in or around its first year or two, and when I got back here in 2009, Holy cow, it was a 4-story waterfall building glassed in next to the planetarium that was built the year before I left for College really near downtown Houston near the Zoological gardens, where the first buttefly habitat was on my visit.

Cockrell Butterfly Center, Houston Museum of Natural Sciences & Planetarium Bldgs.

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[beautress]

They've got too many species flying around any given day at the Cockrell Butterfly center! The last week of school, it's jam-packed with schoolkids, too.

We were members there for the first 6 years we lived here till my husband and best friend passed away. *sigh*
After that, I just holed up in my house, mowed grass 3 days a week and made quilts nonstop for 2 years.
Losing a partner takes time to get adjusted to being alone all the time. Seeing butterflies were happy times during his several years of worsening dementia.
Bless the precious little beasts and the children.





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[Likkmee]

It's en enjoyable way to stay more sane in this world. Another bush tree you might take a shot at is tabebuia carib. They might do OK where you live. The bark is like a sponge. Orchids/bromeliads stick like glue.
If you whack it hard every winter, like you would most any fruit tree, they stay easily controllable.
This girls dad and I started this company when she was in diapers.
Give her a shout. Tell her Murdock referred you.she can recommend neat stuff that works north of central FL and a bit north.It should be " try-able" for you.
Call Jess.
Ricks an old fart like me and growing oranges and Bamboo up near lake Okeechobee.Jess runs the show now.

Freund Flowering Trees Inc.

 

[beautress]

Wonderful website, Likkmee. Thanks. But I've retired from physical efforts due to arthritis moving in my old bones. I can sit and sew, sit and mow, and chase down facts on the computer as needed. And I tried working out, but wasted money on a year to workout when I can just barely get up and down the stairs, much less take my swollen legs and knees to the gymn to walk on a walker that doesn't go slow enough. lol. I haven't been able to push a shovel with bad ankles for about 5 years now. And 23 years of running my own quilt store rendered my green thumb rather brown. More lol. I love seeing what other people do, however. But bugs are so fierce here my organic methods take more energy that no longer wells up in my sore old body. Thanks, Likeme. You're good peoples.

 

[beautress]

Geoverdin: (color name)
Hemistola Chrisoprasaria

(small Emerald moth, Hemistola chrisoprasaria, UK)
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What causes the opaque green colour in Lepidoptera?
Ask Question
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Link here to what I mean by 'opaque' colouration on the insect, the colour intensity remains constant despite changes in light intensity and angle (not shown by the picture but the moth exhibits this in the field). This is different to 'metallic' colouration on other moths like the Forester moth (image here), where the colour intensity changes with light angle and intensity.

Through reading R.F. Chapman's book ('The Insects: Structure and Function'), I know that metallic colours are caused by interference patterns produced by the micro structure of the scales, the book says this is how most higher frequency colours are produced, including green in this category. Obviously I've looked for pigments that could give this colour but I haven't found anything that is produced in insects.

So my question is: Is there a pigment that gives this colour in the insect and if so, what is it?

What causes the opaque green colour in Lepidoptera?
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In an answer, this was written below:

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According to this paper, green pigments are found in lepidoptera. The study focused on Geometridae, and found that the primary pigment in emerald moths, such as Hemistola chrysoprasaria is also found as secondary pigment in Pseudoips prasinana. The authors dubbed the substance 'Geoverdin' and suggest it may be a derivative of chlorophyll consumed during the larval stage. I cannot find any further studies mentioning 'geoverdin' or its chemical identity.

Hemistola chrysoprasaria
the small emerald is a[FONT="Roboto",sans-serif] [/FONT]moth of the family Geometridae.
The species can be found in all[FONT="Roboto",sans-serif] [/FONT]Europe, including the Iberian Peninsula
and Russia, East to the Ural Mountains, North Africa, Asia Minor, Transcaucasia and the mountains of Eastern Asia (Russian Far East, Siberia (Amur Ussuri) and China Tian Shan (as form lissas)​

Description[edit]
The wingspan is 28–32 mm. Both forewings and hindwings are light-green coloured, but fade but with increasing life span to yellow-green to yellow-white.There is an outer and a fainter inner, slightly curved and continuous, white cross line on the front wings. The inner (antemedian) is strongly curved and usually with two small, slight teeth directed distad, the outer (postmedian) is nearly parallel with distal margin, not dentate.The outer line continues on the hindwing.There is no discal stain. The antennae of the males are slightly combed, those of females short ciliate. In Amur and Ussuri the specimens are often large and with the lines rather widely separated.lissas diifers in the shape of the hindwing, which is rounded instead of elbowed[1]

Biology[edit]
The moths fly in one generation from June to August. [1].

The larva feed on Clematis vitalba.

Habitats include edges of woods, hedges areas as well as gardens and parks. It prefers warm slopes.

Subspecies[edit]

• H. c. chrysoprasaria Central Europe, South Europe, South Russia, South Urals - SouthEast Siberia, Turkey, Caucasus, Georgia,
• H. c. lissas Prout, 1912 Tianshan
• H. c. intermedia Djakonov, 1926 mountains (South Siberia)
• H. c. occidentalis Wehrli, 1929 South Spain, South Portugal, Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia

Notes[edit]

1. ^ The flight season refers to the British Isles. This may vary in other parts of the range.

References[edit]

1. ^ Prout , L.B. 1912–16. Geometridae. In A. Seitz (ed.) The Macrolepidoptera of the World. The Palaearctic Geometridae, 4. 479 pp. Alfred Kernen, Stuttgart.

"Phototroph" ~ User Phototroph
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The Green Silver-lines (Pseudoips prasinana) is a moth of the family Nolidae, common in wooded regions, and having a wingspan of 30-35mm. It is found in the Palearctic ecozone (North and Central Europe, Russia, Siberia Korea, Japan).
The wingspan is 30–35 mm. The moth flies from June to July depending on the location.

In August the larvae feed on Oak, Birch and several other deciduous trees.[1]


Pseudoips prasinana - Wikipedia​

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Pseudoips prasinana​

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[beautress]

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[beautress]

From Wikipedia's files:

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[beautress]

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[beautress]

My fave ~ Parthenos sylvia, aka Blue Skipper

 

[beautress]

Hypochrysops delicia, male

female

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[beautress]

Papillo Ulysses Butterfly

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[beautress]

Butterflies of Madagascar

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[beautress]

A little eye candy from the great state of California...

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Butterflies and moths make up the Lepidoptera. The name means "scale wing," and lepidopteran wings are covered with microscopic scales, which are iridescent and brightly colored in the case of this California butterfly, Lycaena helloides
credits: Introduction to the Lepidoptera

 

[beautress]

Colias croseus

Colias croceus, clouded yellow, is a small butterfly of the family Pieridae, that is, the yellows and whites.
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These little gems are so cute, and look at how the coats are apainted.

Discussion from wikipedia:
Life cycle and larval host plants[edit]
Adults fly from March to October.[9] In southern Europe and North Africa they breed continuously throughout the year. Eggs are laid singly on food plant leaves. Usually an extraordinary number of eggs – up to 600 – are laid from a single female.[4]

The caterpillars grow fast in warm weather, sometimes pupating within a month. Caterpillars have 4 moults in total.[4] The pupa remains attached to a foodplant stem by a silk girdle. Pupation lasts for two or three weeks and in good years there can be as many as three generations per year,[4] with adults still on the wing at the beginning of November.

Larvae feed on a variety of leguminous plants, namely Faboideae (Trifolium pratense, Medicago sativa, Medicago lappacea, Medicago hispida, Medicago polymorpha, Medicago sulcata, Vicia, Lotus, Onobrychis, Astragalus, Colutea arborescens, Hippocrepis, and Anthyllis species).[2] In the UK wild and cultivated clovers (Trifolium) and alfalfa (Medicago sativa) are favourites; less frequently, common bird's-foot trefoil Lotus corniculatus is eaten.

Adults feed primarily on nectar of thistles (Cirsium spp. and Carduus spp.), knapweeds (Centaurea spp.), dandelion (Taraxacum), fleabane (Pulicaria dysenterica), marjoram (Origanum vulgare), ragwort (Senecio jacobaea), and vetches (Vicia spp.).[4]

 

[beautress]

Butterflies in song..

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[beautress]

Regal Moth aka Citheronia regalis
Wingspan can reach up to six inches.

Hickory Horned Devil Caterpillar

They're huge.
Good informational page here: Regal Moth

This page too, is helpful: Regal Moth

I cannot believe how beautiful these animals are. I just looked them up on Bing search engine, and Regal Moths and their Hickory Horned Devil Caterpillars are beautiful and one of the largest moths, but in particular, they are the heaviest moths in North America.​