Holly blue
The holly blue is a small butterfly with violet-blue wings on top and pale silvery blue wings with tiny black dots underneath. It usually sits with its wings almost closed. It flies in spring and again in summer.
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Fun facts
It is the national butterfly of Finland.
Its caterpillar has a special gland on its back that attracts ants, and ants often visit it.
It can have two or even three families of butterflies in one year, in spring, in summer and sometimes in autumn.
A tiny wasp lays its eggs inside holly blue caterpillars. Because of this wasp, there are many holly blues in some years and only a few in others.
Most asked questions about Holly blue
?Why is it called the holly blue?
Because its caterpillars feed on the holly tree.
?How big is a holly blue butterfly?
Its wings measure about 2.5 to 3.5 centimetres from tip to tip.
?What does the holly blue caterpillar eat?
In spring it eats holly, and in summer ivy, bramble, dogwood and other plants.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Celastrina argiolus
- Named by
- Linnaeus, 1758
- Group
- Butterflies
- Family
- Lycaenidae
- Classification
- Insecta > Lepidoptera > Lycaenidae
- Lives on
- Europe, Asia
- Also known as
- Hill hedge blue
Where the facts come from
- Holly blue (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 Charles J. Sharp. CC BY-SA 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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