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Sticker of Great jay
Bug card No. 2021 of 4,939

Great jay

Graphium eurypylus
Name means: “probably Eurypylus, a king in the old stories of the Trojan War”
Eats: PlantsButterfliesRainforests and jungles6 legs

The great jay is a swallowtail butterfly from warm rainforests. Its black wings are decorated with chains of pale green spots, and a big green patch sits in the middle of each front wing. Underneath, its back wings have a few bright red spots.

Lives in
Northeast India, Southeast Asia and Australia
Wingspan
7 to 8 cm (2.8 to 3.1 in)
Top speed
about 17 km/h (11 mph)
Flying, estimate
Can it hurt you?
Harmless
Harmless. It does not bite or sting.
What does it eat?
Its caterpillars eat the leaves of custard apple and soursop trees and their relatives.
For real!Photo of Great jay
Picture by Aviceda. CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

How big is it?

How wide are its wings?

Great jay wings about 8 cm tip to tip (3.1 in)A toy building brick about 3.2 cm (1.3 in)A crayon about 9 cm (3.5 in)A banana about 18 cm (7.1 in)
wings as wide as 2.5 toy building brickscould fly across a whole football pitch in 22 seconds

How big is Great jay compared to YOU?

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How fast is it?

cool stuff

Fun facts

1

Its wings are about 7 to 8 centimetres from tip to tip.

2

Its caterpillar is black or smoky until it grows up, then it turns dull green.

3

Its pupa is usually green, but it can change colour to match whatever it is hanging on.

4

It has many slightly different kinds on different islands.

you asked

Most asked questions about Great jay

?What does the great jay eat?

Its caterpillars eat custard apple and soursop leaves and similar plants.

?How big is the great jay butterfly?

Its wings are about 7 to 8 centimetres from tip to tip.

For bug experts

Scientific name
Graphium eurypylus
Group
Butterflies
Family
Papilionidae
Classification
Insecta > Lepidoptera > Papilionidae
Lives on
Asia, Australia and Oceania
Also known as
Pale green triangle

Where the facts come from

  1. Graphium eurypylus (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0): what it looks like, where it lives, what it eats, sizes and fun facts, retold in simple words.
  2. Picture by Aviceda. CC BY-SA 3.0, Wikimedia Commons. The sticker of this bug is drawn from this 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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More from the same group: Butterflies

Also at home here: Rainforests and jungles

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