Eastern comma
The eastern comma is an orange-brown butterfly with jagged wing edges. Underneath, its wings are striped brown like a dead leaf, with a tiny silver mark shaped like a comma. That little mark gives the butterfly its name.
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Fun facts
There is a summer look and a winter look: in summer the back wings are black on top, in winter they are reddish orange.
The grown-up caterpillar folds a leaf together with silk to make a little daytime tent.
The caterpillar eats at night and hides in its tent during the day.
The winter butterflies sleep through the cold months, and some fly south instead.
It looks very much like its cousin, the question mark butterfly. The shape of the silver mark tells them apart.
Most asked questions about Eastern comma
?Why is it called the eastern comma?
Because of the small silver comma-shaped mark under its back wings, and because it lives in eastern North America.
?What does the eastern comma eat?
It drinks tree sap, juice from rotting fruit and minerals from puddles, and only seldom visits flowers.
?How big is the eastern comma?
Its wings are about 4.5 to 6.4 centimetres across.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Polygonia comma
- Group
- Butterflies
- Family
- Nymphalidae
- Classification
- Insecta > Lepidoptera > Nymphalidae
- Lives on
- North America
Where the facts come from
- Polygonia comma (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0): what it looks like, where it lives, what it eats, sizes and fun facts, retold in simple words.
- Picture by JeffreyGammon. CC BY 4.0, Wikimedia Commons. The round sticker of this bug is cut from the same picture.
If we got something wrong, sorry, we are bug fans, not a science journal. Tell us at [email protected] and we will fix it.
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