Common palmfly
The common palmfly is a butterfly that lives among palm trees in Asia. In many places the male and female look completely different. The male is dark with blue spots, while the female is tawny orange with black veins and white spots.
How fast is it?
Fun facts
Both the male and the female copy the look of other butterflies that taste bad, so birds leave them alone.
Its bright green caterpillar has two little horns on its head and two spines at its tail.
The caterpillars sometimes eat each other.
Its green pupa hangs by its tail but sticks out flat and stiff, decorated with rows of yellow spots.
Most asked questions about Common palmfly
?Why is it called the common palmfly?
Because its caterpillars live on palm trees, such as coconut palms.
?Do male and female palmflies look the same?
In many places they do not. The male is dark with blue spots and the female is orange with white spots.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Elymnias hypermnestra
- Group
- Butterflies
- Family
- Nymphalidae
- Classification
- Insecta > Lepidoptera > Nymphalidae
- Lives on
- Asia
Where the facts come from
- Elymnias hypermnestra (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 J.M.Garg. CC BY 2.5, Wikimedia Commons. The sticker of this bug is drawn from this picture.
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