Swordgrass brown
Tisiphone abeona
The swordgrass brown is a brown butterfly that lives only in Australia. Its caterpillars feed on sword-grass, tall plants with sharp-edged leaves, and that is where its name comes from. Its wings are about 6 centimetres across.
Lives in
Eastern and southeastern Australia, from Queensland to Victoria, where sword-grass grows
Wingspan
6 cm (2.4 in)
Can it hurt you?
Harmless
Harmless. Butterflies cannot bite or sting.
What does it eat?
Its caterpillars eat sword-grass plants of the genus Gahnia.
How big is it?
How wide are its wings?
🧱wings as wide as 2 toy building bricks⚽could fly across a whole football pitch in 25 seconds
How big is Swordgrass brown 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)
Swordgrass brown about 15 km/h (9.3 mph)
A grown-up on a bike about 25 km/h (16 mph)
cool stuff
Fun facts
1
It is found nowhere else in the world except Australia.
2
There are eight subspecies, each living in its own part of eastern Australia.
3
Its caterpillars eat only sword-grass.
you asked
Most asked questions about Swordgrass brown
?What does the swordgrass brown eat?
Its caterpillars eat sword-grass plants.
?Where does the swordgrass brown live?
Only in eastern and southeastern Australia.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Tisiphone abeona
- Named by
- Donovan, 1805
- Group
- Butterflies
- Family
- Nymphalidae
- Classification
- Insecta > Lepidoptera > Nymphalidae
- Lives on
- Australia and Oceania
Where the facts come from
- Tisiphone abeona (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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