Dryadula phaetusa

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Dryadula phaetusa
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia Division: Rhopalocera Phylum: Arthropoda Class: Insecta Order: Lepidoptera Family: Nymphalidae Subfamily: Heliconiinae Tribe: Heliconiini Subtribe: Heliconiiti Genus: Dryadula Species: D. phaetusa
Binomial name
Dryadula phaetusa (Linnaeus, 1758)

Dryadula phaetusa, also known as the Banded Orange Heliconian, Banded Orange, or Orange Tiger, is a species of butterfly (an insect). The sole representative of its genus, the Banded Orange Heliconian is native from Brazil to central Mexico, and in summer can be found rarely as far north as central Kansas. Its wingspan ranges from 86 to 89 mm, and it is colored a bright orange with thick black stripes in males, and a duller orange with fuzzier black stripes in females.

It feeds primarily on the nectar of flowers and bird droppings, and its caterpillar forms hosts in passion vines including Passiflora tetrastylis. It is generally found in lowland tropical fields and valleys.

This species is somewhat unpalatable to birds and belongs to the "orange" Batesian mimic complex (Pinheiro 1996).

[edit] References

• Pinheiro, Carlos E. G. (1996): Palatablility and escaping ability in Neotropical butterflies: tests with wild kingbirds (Tyrannus melancholicus, Tyrannidae). Biol. J. Linn. Soc. 59(4): 351–365. HTML abstract

• Dryadula phaetusa, Butterflies of North America, from the United States Geological Survey, Northern Prairie Wildlife Research Center.

[edit] External links

• Minnesota Zoo's Butterfly Garden - features the Dryadula phaetusa butterfly.