Pink-spotted cattleheart
Parides photinus
The pink-spotted cattleheart is a big black swallowtail butterfly. Its back wings shine blue-green like metal and have two rows of red spots along the edge. It lives in the forests of Central America.
Lives in
Mexico to Costa Rica, in forests
Wingspan
9 to 10 cm (3.5 to 3.9 in)
Can it hurt you?
Harmless
Harmless. It cannot bite or sting.
What does it eat?
The butterflies drink nectar from flowers. The caterpillars eat pipevine plants.
How big is it?
How wide are its wings?
✋wings as wide as your hand⚽could fly across a whole football pitch in 20 seconds
How big is Pink-spotted cattleheart compared to YOU?
Just maths in your browser. Nothing is saved or sent anywhere.
How fast is it?
A kid running fast about 13 km/h (8.1 mph)
Pink-spotted cattleheart about 19 km/h (12 mph)
A grown-up on a bike about 25 km/h (16 mph)
A car driving in town about 50 km/h (31 mph)
cool stuff
Fun facts
1
The blue-green shine on the back wings is strongest in the males.
2
Its back wings end in short tails.
3
Its wings look almost the same underneath as on top.
4
It is common in forests from the seaside up to 1,500 metres high.
you asked
Most asked questions about Pink-spotted cattleheart
?Where does the pink-spotted cattleheart live?
In forests from Mexico to Costa Rica, including Honduras and Nicaragua.
?How big is the pink-spotted cattleheart?
Its wings measure 90 to 100 millimetres from tip to tip.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Parides photinus
- Named by
- Doubleday, 1844
- Group
- Butterflies
- Family
- Papilionidae
- Classification
- Insecta > Lepidoptera > Papilionidae
- Lives on
- North America
Where the facts come from
- Parides photinus (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 D. Gordon E. Robertson. CC BY-SA 3.0, Wikimedia Commons. The sticker of this bug is drawn from this picture.
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