PAPILIO MULTICAUDATA

[jaume]

papilio multicaudatus pusillus from northern US, multicaudatus multicaudatus from southern US and northern Mexico, multicaudatus grandiosus from southwestern Mexico and multicaudatus grandiosus from Guatemala. In my opinion the guatemalan ones are the most beautiful with dark yellow and a lot of orange on HW.

JAUME

[admin]

Hot dang! I have never seen one in the wilds.

[homard]

Dec 26, 2013 11:21:23 GMT -8 jaume said:

In my opinion the guatemalan ones are the most beautiful with dark yellow and a lot of orange on HW.

JAUME

Agreed!
I have not them from Guatemala but have one from S. Mexico. It's much more "decorated" than
US' specimens

[evra]

Here you go Clark, from last March.   It is hard to get really close to them when they puddle, plus my camera didn't have a telephoto lens.  I did manage to net all 6 males though. 

Attachments:

[beetlehorn]

I still remember seeing them in Arizona last year and the year before. I was lucky enough to capture a few, as well as a perfect female while out with my friend Evan. It would be interesting to rear them, and actually document all the stages in a video, but I just can't stay in Arizona that long.

[bobw]

I saw them in Utah a couple of years ago flying with rutulus. I managed to get a couple of females of each but whatever I tried they refused to lay.

Bob

[leptraps]

In 1999 I made a trip to Arizona to attend the Lepidopterists Society meeting in Sierra Vista. I traveled through Texas and made numerous stops. One of those stop was Sanderson Canyon in Terrell County. The area had experienced a rather wet summer and the canyon was full of flowers. And visiting these flowers were literally hundreds of Pterourus multicaudata. I collected a dozen or more males and four females. They were not easy to find with all of their tails.

I have been to the Sanderson Canyon location many times since 1999 and have never seen another P. multicaudata.

I have collected them in Colorado, Idaho, Washington and Wyoming, but never more than two or three specimens at any location.

Also during the 1999 trip to Sanderson Canyon I collected the only Pterourus pilumnus I have ever seen. A perfect male. It was smaller than P. multicaudata and its flight was very fast.

I love going out west to collect.

[jaume]

Multicaudata is one of my favourite species from the America's. It's a spectacular species and some specimens are really huge. I have collected it many times in Mexico and in fact there it's a common species flying even in cities with a very high level of environmental pollution like Mexico DF. But for my experience I never found more of 3-4 specimens at the same location. Another problem with this species is getting intact specimens. It's extremely difficult to find them in perfect condition

JAUME

[evra]

It's kind of a strange species with lots of quirks. For example, the only time I ever see them at mud puddles is in the spring during the morning. They don't come to flowers predictably either. Occasionally the'll come to certain flowers in numbers, like Penstemon, or bergamot, but it is hard to figure it out. I see 95% of them flying around through riparian areas, and their tails, especially the primary ones, are much more fragile than other tiger swallowtails. When you net one on the wing, there's usually a 50-50 chance that you break off the tail.

Finding larvae isn't too bad, but not as easy as Papilio polyxenes coloro or P. cresphontes. They feed on desert hop tree at low elevations, various wild cherries at high elevations, and ash at all elevations.

[joee30]

They are here in northern Nevada, and I have a couple of locations where they have been collected historically, along with P.bairdii, P. indra nevadensis, and P.zelicaon. There are a lot of canyons with chokecherry, which is one of their host plants, and it is common in some of the ditches and planted here in Reno. I'm looking forward to give a try an raising some, along with other leps like Hyalophora gloveri, Papilio indra nevadensis, and Hemileauca hera to name a few.

[exoticimports]

Does anyone know the differences between ssp multicaudata and ssp grandiosus? Are there seasonal variations?

Thanks,

Chuck

[jshuey]

Nov 4, 2018 17:55:10 GMT -8 exoticimports said:

Does anyone know the differences between ssp multicaudata and ssp grandiosus? Are there seasonal variations?

Thanks,

Chuck

Hi Chuck - the original description is buried in a book that few have seen - myself included. But based on the name, and the bugs I've seen, grandiosus may well refer to its size. It's huge compared to the bugs I have from the western US. And it is very lavishly marked, with lots of blue and deep orange on the hindwing - especially the females.

I've seen it on three occasions in Chiapas and Guatemala - and all the bugs are very similar. So - based on my limited observations (which are all in early to late summer), I see no sign of seasonal variation. It is not rare in the right setting. You see it flying commonly over San Cristobal (and Antigua) in the morning - and then there is a pasture with scattered thistles on the edge of San Cristobal where they spend the afternoon.

John

[58chevy]

My son lives in Colorado Springs, CO. There is a hill behind his house with thistles that attract multicaudata daily during summer months.

[exoticimports]

Here's why I asked about multicaudata and grandiosa. See photo below (bad photo). All are Arizona. Those of the left are generally larger, and much deeper orange color, with less color in HW margin.

Data is as follows:
All on left: Pima Co. August
Right top: Pima Co. March
Right middle: Cochise Co., July
Right bottom: Cochise Co., July

[trehopr1]

Going by the what the originator of this thread (Jaume) indicated it seems your specimens should be the nominate for the Southern U.S. whereas subspecies pusillus is from states further North. He mentions grandiosus as being from the region of Southwest Mexico and on farther South into Belize and Guatemala. Perhaps your males are only showing a size variation due to food plant competition. Maybe the color variance is due to different kinds of food sources.
I know that in the case of having raised Antherea polyphemus on different trees I had a mix of rich brown tones show up as the background color for the different tree leaves which were fed upon.
I kind of relate "grandiosus" as being the super-size (subspecies) or version of that already large butterfly multicaudata. Much like subspecies "maynardi" is the super-size and grandest version of Papilio glaucus.
Perhaps, your March specimen is smaller due to it being a "spring brood" male.