Brown ringlet
Hypocysta metirius
The brown ringlet is a small brown butterfly with an orange patch and a round eyespot on each back wing. It flies low over the ground and often stops to open its wings. Underneath, it has two eyespots with a little silver spot between them.
Lives in
The east coast of Australia, in open forests and at rainforest edges
Wingspan
3.1 cm (1.2 in)
Can it hurt you?
Harmless
Harmless. It cannot bite or sting.
What does it eat?
The grown-ups sip nectar. The caterpillars eat grasses.
How big is it?
How wide are its wings?
🍚wings as wide as 5 grains of rice in a row⚽could fly across a whole football pitch in 34 seconds
How big is Brown ringlet 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)
Brown ringlet about 11 km/h (6.8 mph)
A kid running fast about 13 km/h (8.1 mph)
A grown-up on a bike about 25 km/h (16 mph)
cool stuff
Fun facts
1
Males and females are the same size, with wings about 3 centimetres across.
2
Its eyespots may help scare off or confuse birds.
3
In southern New South Wales it also lives in coastal heath and woodland.
you asked
Most asked questions about Brown ringlet
?What does the brown ringlet eat?
The caterpillars eat grasses, such as Bermuda grass.
?Where can I see a brown ringlet?
Along the east coast of Australia, in Queensland and New South Wales.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Hypocysta metirius
- Group
- Butterflies
- Family
- Nymphalidae
- Classification
- Insecta > Lepidoptera > Nymphalidae
- Lives on
- Australia and Oceania
- Also known as
- Common brown ringlet
Where the facts come from
- Hypocysta metirius (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 Andrew Allen. CC BY 4.0, Wikimedia Commons. The sticker of this bug is drawn from this picture.
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