Canadian Tiger Swallowtail

Fascinating facts about the Canadian Tiger Swallowtail

• It lives so far north that its range reaches beyond the Arctic Circle in the Yukon, extending also to Churchill, Little Shagamu River and Schefferville. The butterfly is found in most provinces and territories across Canada and even reaches the northern third of the United States. It is absent from southern British Columbia and parts of southwestern Ontario, where other swallowtails replace it.
• Hundreds of individuals can congregate at a single puddle, making it one of the most popular puddling butterflies. Adults are on the wing during spring and summer, when a single brood emerges each year. After emerging, they seek mineral-rich moisture, often forming large gatherings that can number in the hundreds. This behaviour is most noticeable when the butterflies are actively feeding on nectar and searching for salts.
• It will occasionally hybridise with both eastern and western tiger swallowtails, but such events are extremely rare. The species has been recorded to produce hybrids with the eastern tiger swallowtail and the western tiger swallowtail, although sightings are seldom observed in the wild. These rare hybrids demonstrate the close genetic relationship within the group, yet the species largely remains distinct across its range.
• The caterpillar builds a protective shelter by folding the host-plant's leaves together and stitching them with silk, then feeds from inside that concealed chamber. In its mature form it is a large green larva with an enlarged head, four yellow dots and two bluish-centred false eyes that give it a snake-like profile. When the larvae are still immature they are brown and white, a colour pattern that closely resembles bird droppings.

Sources

Every fact above was checked against these pages, and kept only where one of them states it.

• Wikipedia

At a glance

About the Canadian Tiger Swallowtail

As the Canadian Tiger Swallowtail dances through the sun-dappled forests of North America, its tawny wings beat with a hypnotic rhythm, leaving a trail of golden light in its wake. With an effortless elegance, it glides from bloom to bloom, its proboscis uncoiling like a slender thread to sip the sweet nectar that sustains it. In this fleeting, whirling world of color and motion, the Canadian Tiger Swallowtail is a masterpiece of evolution, its very existence a testament to the beauty and wonder that still awaits us in the uncharted corners of the natural world.

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