| Red Helen | |
|---|---|
| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Arthropoda |
| Class: | Insecta |
| Order: | Lepidoptera |
| Family: | Papilionidae |
| Genus: | Papilio |
| Species: | P. helenus |
| Binomial name | |
| Papilio helenus Linnaeus, 1758 |
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The Red Helen Papilio helenus is a large swallowtail butterfly found in forests in southern India and parts of Southeast Asia.
Contents |
Sri Lanka, southern and North-East India, Nepal, Bhutan, Bangladesh, Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, Kampuchea, Vietnam, southern China (including Hainan, Guangdong province), southern Japan, South Korea, Ryukyu Islands. Peninsular and Eastern Malaysia, Brunei, Philippines, and Indonesia (Sumatra, Java, Bangka, Kalimantan and the Lesser Sunda Islands except Tanimbar). In India, along the Western Ghats from Kerala to Gujarat, also Palnis and Shevaroys. In the north from Mussoorie eastwards, to North-East India and onto Myanmar.
Common and not threatened. Common from Kerala to Maharashtra, rare in Gujarat. Found in abundant in the North East India, very commonly sighted in Assam.
Up to thirteen different subspecies of which two occur in India :-
Flies throughout the year in South India. Like any other butterflies, it goes through a certain life cycle.
The egg is pale apricot yellow in colour when freshly deposited, spherical in shape and has a slightly roughened exterior which looks like the skin of an orange when seen through a microscope. The diameter of an egg is 1.2 mm.
The eggs are deposited singly on the tips of very young leaves and shoots in shady parts of thick jungle. Before hatching, the eggs appear to be marked by chocolate coloured lines and flecks. The egg hatches in 4–7 days.
The freshly emerged larva is about 3 mm long with two yellow osmeteria (horn like processes) covered with setae on the first segment, a similar pair on the last segment and a nearly white smaller pair on the segment before the last. Each of the other segments bears, on the back, a pair of tufts of stiff hairs, each tuft arising from a small, yellowish conical process. The overall colour is brown, but there is a whitish saddle-like patch about the middle and the tail segments are also whitish in colour.
As with other Papilios there is a branched horn on the osmeterium which the larva extrudes when irritated. This secretes an unpleasant smelling liquid which is believed to repel predators and parasites.
After the first moult the caterpillar has the appearance of a shiny bird dropping. The larva is grass green in colour, mottled black and white and smoky grey. The osmeterium is flesh-coloured.
The young larva lies along the midrib of the leaf. Later on, when full-grown, it lies on the centre of the upperside of the leaf, on a stem or a twig. The fifth instar larva is about 5 cm long.