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Question Mark

Fritillaries?
June 23, 2010
Hi Daniel, I don’t know the species of these but maybe something you were looking for. They are some that looked sort of like “Fritillaries” to me. I have more but the site only allows three images. If you would like more let me know and I will send them thru outlook express. Thank You and have a great day
Richard
North Middle Tennessee

comma richard 300x233 Question Mark

Question Mark

Hi Again Richard,
This butterfly is actually the other butterfly we requested images of, the Question Mark, so named because of the silver marks that look like an interrogation punctuation sign on the under side of the hind wings.  We have already posted your other photos of Fritillaries.

Posted 23 June 2010 § Brush Footed Butterflies ‡ Comments (2) °
What's That Bug? does not endorse extermination

Great Spangled Fritillary

Fritillaries?
June 23, 2010
Hi Daniel, I don’t know the species of these but maybe something you were looking for. They are some that looked sort of like “Fritillaries” to me. I have more but the site only allows three images. If you would like more let me know and I will send them thru outlook express. Thank You and have a great day
Richard
North Middle Tennessee

fritillary richard1 300x297 Great Spangled Fritillary

Great Spangled Fritillary

Hi Richard,
Two of your photos are of Fritillaries, probably the Great Spangled Fritillary, Speyeria cybele, which is profiled on BugGuide.  Your third photo is of a Question Mark, the other butterfly we requested photos of.

fritillary richard 2 300x280 Great Spangled Fritillary

Great Spangled Fritillary

Posted 23 June 2010 § Brush Footed Butterflies ‡ Comments (1) °

Cattleheart Butterfly from Butterfly Pavilion in Costa Rica

Costa Rican Butterflies
June 22, 2010
Dear Bugman,
I recently went on an educational trip to Costa Rica. While there, I saw many different species of butterflies but, now that i’m home, i haven’t been able to figure out the species or even what type of butterflies i had seen. This is a major issue considering the fact that i now must do a project on the different invertebrates i saw while there! The first one was spotted in my shower at a hotel in Arenal. It was hanging from the ceiling and the tear drop shaped “tails” were slightly metalic. I would estimate that it was around 3-4 inches across. The second, was spotted in Tortuguero. it was very small, only about 1.5 inches across and flew rather quickly. And the third we saw in a Butterfly garden. There were several that kept landing on us and they were about… 2 inches across. Thanks so much for your help!
Amanda K.
Costa Rica (Arenal, Tortuguero)

cattleheart costa rica amanda 300x166 Cattleheart Butterfly from Butterfly Pavilion in Costa Rica

Cattleheart Butterfly

Ed. Note:
We did not respond a second time to Amanda after identifying her Eyetail Moth, but we wanted to post her photo of a Cattleheart Butterfly in the genus Paredes as well.  Cattlehearts are in the Swallowtail family and they frequently appear in butterfly pavilions.  This might not even be a species native to Costa Rica.  It resembles the drawing of the Green Celled Cattleheart, Paredes childrenae, that can be found on the Costa Rica Butterflies Fold-Out Pocket Field Guide webpage.

Karl provides some information
Hi Daniel and Amanda:
It is indeed a Cattleheart in the genus Parides and there are several candidate species that are native to Costa Rica. The Butterflies of America site has an excellent selection of photos of the genus, including several that look very close but none that are an exact match. It could be a Wedge-spotted Cattleheart (Parides panares lycimenes) but I think it is more likely in the P. eurimedes group (P. eurimedes; P. e. mylotes; P. e. mycale; P. mylotes; P. arcas). There seems to be some taxonomic uncertainty here as various combinations of these names (and more) are variously given as species, subspecies or synonyms. It could be any of these if they are distinct, or perhaps a hybrid. The Area de Conservación Guanacaste (ACG) site has a near perfect match that it refers to as P. mylotes. Possible common names include True, Eurimedes or Mylotes Cattleheart. Regards.  Karl

Posted 23 June 2010 § swallowtails ‡ Comments (1) °
What's That Bug? does not endorse extermination

White Admiral

White Admiral Butterfly
June 13, 2010
Love your site! I photographed this butterfly in Eastern Ontario in a natural forested area (mostly aspens and birch trees). They are quite common here. I think I have identified it correctly (thanks to your wonderful site) as a White Adminral.
Stephanie
Embrun, Ontario

white admiral ontario stephanie 300x239 White Admiral

White Admiral

Hi Stephanie,
You have properly identified your White Admiral, Limenitis arthemis arthemis, and you have also gotten excellent documentary photographs of a lovely specimen.  The White Admiral and the Red Spotted Purple are considered subspecies of the same species, with the White Admiral exhibiting the coloration of the northern population, and the Red Spotted Purple exhibiting the coloration of the southern population.  There are also intermediate forms where the ranges of the populations overlap.  To make things even more complicated, there is also a Wester White Admiral, again a subspecies.  BugGuide has nice photos showing the various subspecies.

white admiral stephanie 2 300x204 White Admiral

White Admiral

Thank you Daniel. I hadn’t expected a reply but you’ve surprised me.  You must get 100′s of emails a day asking to id various insects.  You’ve made my day!
Stephanie

Hi Stephanie,
While it is true that we are receiving about 100 emails daily right now, and we cannot read, much less answer or post them all, we do have a random system of choosing which letters to read.  Your subject line caught our attention because the White Admiral is a lovely butterfly and we were hoping the images were of high quality.  Your photos exceeded our expectations.  We were also happy that you had attempted to identify the species yourself and you were successful.

Posted 14 June 2010 § Brush Footed Butterflies ‡ Comments (0) °

Giant Robber Fly eats Buckeye Butterfly

Asilidae help
June 6, 2010
hello Bugman this is my first time doing this so bear with me. I am a 24year old aspiring entomologist from portage county (NE) Ohio. Besides the average ‘prairies and meadows bordered by woodlands’ can you reveal more information on where to find Promachus robberflies in this area? Your information will be greatly appreciated.
sincerely, Ben
hope this helps,
portage county ohio

giant robberfly eats buckeye hdr 300x233 Giant Robber Fly eats Buckeye Butterfly

Giant Robber Fly eats Buckeye Butterfly

Dear Ben,
This sure is a spectacular photo of a Giant Robberfly in the genus Promachus feeding on a Buckeye Butterfly.  Since we do not collect insects, we cannot offer much advice on where to hunt, and the information you provided on prairies and meadows is already indicated on BugGuide.  Perhaps one of our more knowledgeable readers will provide a comment on your posting.

Posted 07 June 2010 § Brush Footed Butterflies § Robber Flies ‡ Comments (0) ° Tagged:

Sword Grass Brown from Australia

Australian Butterfly
June 1, 2010
Hi again Bugman. It’s handy to have your camera around at all times: I always have difficulties getting decent photos of butterflies, but this morning, on the first winter day in Australia, I spotted this beautiful specimen on the window of our deck. Maybe it was a bit stiff because of the ‘cold’ (about 60 degrees Fahrenheit). I haven’t been able to identify it yet, so if you can, I’d be thrilled!
Ridou
Sydney Australia

swork grass brown australia ridou 300x230 Sword Grass Brown from Australia

Sword Grass Brown

Hi Ridou,
We thought this must be a Satyr or Wood Nymph in the subfamily Satyrinae of the Brush Footed Butterfly family, so we did a web search.  We quickly found an image of the Sword Grass Brown, Tisiphone abeona, on the TrekNature website.  Another posting on TrekNature has this information:  “a common medium sized butterfly of the coastal forests of south-eastern Australia. With a wingspan of 52mm and a habit of patrolling walking tracks and bush trails, this is a well-known butterfly. They rarely fly more than 2m off the ground and are active from September to April. Their common name is related to their host plant, sword grass (Gahina sp), a tall stiff grass with razor sharp edges.”

sword grass brown australia open ridou 300x204 Sword Grass Brown from Australia

Sword Grass Brown

Posted 01 June 2010 § Brush Footed Butterflies ‡ Comments (0) °

Plain Tiger and Blue Pansy Butterflies from Indonesia

Butterflies
May 29, 2010
I started photography as a hobby few months ago and because of that I started to like butterfly. This butterfly photograph was taken today near my home. I don’t know its scientific name, actually I don’t know anything about bugs (butterfly).
I hope you can explain it to me. Thanks.
Firman Hadi
Bandung, Java, Indonesia

danaus chrysippus indonesia fermin 267x300 Plain Tiger and Blue Pansy Butterflies from Indonesia

Plain Tiger

Hi Firman,
You have two different species of butterflies in your photos.  The one that is labeled ketahuan is a Milkweed Butterfly, and we quickly identified it as Danaus chrysippus on Wikipedia, where it is known as the Common Tiger.  This is a wide ranging species, and according to another website we found, tolweb.org, it is commonly called an African Queen.  TrekNature has a nice photo for comparison.  We identified your second butterfly as a Blue Pansy on the Butterflies Photo Gallery of Paul Riley website, but there is no scientific name.  Web searching the common name led us to another site of Butterflies in Indonesia and the scientific name Junonia orithya.  The TrekNature website also pictures this lovely species.  The blue coloration, from what we have read, is limited to the male.  Both the Plain Tiger and Blue Pansy are in the brush footed butterfly family Nymphalidae.

blue pansy indonesia firman 300x214 Plain Tiger and Blue Pansy Butterflies from Indonesia

Blue Pansy

Dear Daniel,
Thanks for the information. Later I will find first from the website that you mention icon biggrin Plain Tiger and Blue Pansy Butterflies from Indonesia
I think I am starting to love butterfly, more than birds .
Kind regards,
Firman Hadi.

Posted 29 May 2010 § Brush Footed Butterflies ‡ Comments (0) °

Hairstreak

Butterfly
May 25, 2010
Hello Daniel,
I haven’t been able to ID this little butterfly after looking through 35 pages of butterflies on your website. (What a treat, butterflies are my favorite) Can you help with its ID? Sorry I couldn’t get a photo with open wings, which may have made IDing a bit easier. Thank you for everything.
Richard
North Middle Tennessee

hairstreak richard 300x261 Hairstreak

Hairstreak

Hi Richard,
It is a Hairstreak, but since we are late for work, we can’t look up species right now.
http://bugguide.net/node/view/383/bgimage

Thank you Daniel,  for taking the time to answer my butterfly request. Hairstreak narrows it down close enough for me, please don’t go to a lot of trouble searching for the sub species for me. I know you are busy and I don’t want to take up any of your valuable time. Thanks again and have a wonderful day.
Richard

Posted 26 May 2010 § Gossamer Wings ‡ Comments (0) °

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