Western white
Pontia occidentalis
The western white is a white butterfly from western North America. Underneath, the tips of its front wings and its back wings have veins drawn in grey green. Its caterpillars like the flowers and seed pods of plants in the cabbage family.
Lives in
Western North America
Wingspan
3.8 to 5.3 cm (1.5 to 2.1 in)
Can it hurt you?
Harmless
Harmless. It cannot bite or sting.
What does it eat?
Its caterpillars eat plants of the mustard and cabbage family, especially the flowers, buds and seed pods.
How big is it?
How wide are its wings?
🧱wings as wide as 1.5 toy building bricks⚽could fly across a whole football pitch in 27 seconds
How big is Western white compared to YOU?
Just maths in your browser. Nothing is saved or sent anywhere.
How fast is it?
A person walking about 5 km/h (3.1 mph)
A kid running fast about 13 km/h (8.1 mph)
Western white about 14 km/h (8.7 mph)
A grown-up on a bike about 25 km/h (16 mph)
cool stuff
Fun facts
1
Its wings measure about 4 to 5 centimetres from tip to tip.
2
In the north it has one family of babies a year, flying in June and July.
3
In the south it has two families and flies from May to August.
you asked
Most asked questions about Western white
?What does the western white eat?
Its caterpillars eat plants of the cabbage and mustard family, mostly their flowers and seed pods.
?Where does the western white live?
In western North America.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Pontia occidentalis
- Group
- Butterflies
- Family
- Pieridae
- Classification
- Insecta > Lepidoptera > Pieridae
- Lives on
- North America
Where the facts come from
- Pontia occidentalis (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 Walter Siegmund (talk). CC BY 2.5, Wikimedia Commons. The sticker of this bug is drawn from this picture.
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