Yesterday my daddy had an appointment with his doctor because he had abnormal results from a routine blood test. As he was telling me the doctor thought it was “nothing to worry about,” I saw this beautiful spicebush swallowtail butterfly (Papilio troilus) on my lantana. Such a peaceful picture to go along with wonderful news.

This butterfly is said to mimic the foul tasting pipevine swallowtail to ward off predators. It also looks similar to the black swallowtail and red spotted purple. The reason it is called a spicebush butterfly is because spicebush and sassafras are its host plants where it lays its eggs. It is a swallowtail because of the spoon-like appendage on the bottom of its wings. This one is supposedly a female because the male’s coloration is more green instead of blue.

Getting a good picture proved difficult because it kept moving its wings trying to dry or warm them and didn’t sit still to drink the nectar. Eventually it found a sunny place to sit and relax with its wings opened.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 22nd, 2008 at 9:37 pm and is filed under Nature Study. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.