Guide to Common Butterflies List
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Welcome to MacArthur Beach State Park! Great Southern White (Ascia monuste) Ruddy Daggerwing (Marpesia petreus) Mangrove Skipper (Phocides pigmalion) This guide will introduce you to some of the Its turquoise antennae tips This is a large colorful This spread-winged Park’s butterflies. Butterflies are insects in the and dark zigzag wing butterfly with long skipper is larger and margins are distinctive. “dagger-like” tails, showier than most order Lepidoptera. They go through a Females can be grayish found flying high skippers. They fly complete metamorphosis with a life cycle of 4 brown in the summer. It is when it’s not on along the estuary and stages: 1. Egg (placed on specific caterpillar easy to confuse with flowers sipping often land underneath food “host” plants); 2. Caterpillar (larval Florida White, now rare in nectar. Its wings are a leaf. It’s limited to stage feeds on “larval host plants”); 3. Palm Beach County. It lays paler underneath and coastal central and Chrysalis (pupal stage); and 4. Adult (most eggs on plants in the look like a dried leaf when folded. At first glance south Florida by its feed on flower nectar). Some of these winged mustard family, like coastal searocket, Jamaica it may resemble a Julia butterfly, but its tails and larval host plant, red wonders are fast-moving high flyers, some caper-tree, limber caper, and peppergrass. It can be jagged wings are a good ID. It’s a subtropical mangrove. Its caterpillars use silk to weave a abundant and seen in large numbers along the coast butterfly that flies in hardwood hammocks looking shelter on the red mangrove leaves. They nectar are small and quick, flitting among trees, during spring and early summer. for its larval host plant, strangler fig. It is common on mangrove flowers, sea lavender, Spanish shrubs and flowers, and a few are shade- most of the year but particularly summer and fall. needles and wild sage. loving gliders, gracefully floating through the Statira Sulphur (Aphrissa statira) hammock or darting along the estuary shore This is a medium-sized light- Soldier (Danaus eresimus) Long-tailed Skipper (Urbanus proteus) line. Search high, low, and in-between, yellow butterfly. Females The soldier is a This is a neotropical, watching for the slightest movement as you are pale yellow. Males are milkweed butterfly also medium-sized skipper, enjoy your visit through this subtropical greenish yellow. It’s endemic known as “tropical noticeable for its long tails coastal habitat. to coastal Florida and queen.” It colonized and blue-green furry sometimes found inland. Florida in the 1970s. It body. It has many larval Zebra Heliconian (Heliconius charitonius) They are seen most of the resembles monarch and host plants in the pea Florida’s state butterfly! year along the estuary where its larval host plant, queen butterflies and is family, including beggar- It’s a “longwing” tropical coinvine, grows among the mangroves. In the summer hard to ID when it’s weed and downy milkpea. species but strays north. It they are more numerous. Their favorite nectar plants flying. It is slightly smaller with faded patches on Like many skipper flies slowly in the shade have red flowers like the firebush. its hindwing below. Milkweed vine is its larval host caterpillars, they weave a of maritime hammock plant. There are times when it is common at the shelter of leaves with their trees and lays its eggs on Large Orange Sulphur (Phoebis agarithe) Park but scarce other years. silk. They are more passionflower vines such It’s a subtropical endemic abundant during the late summer. They fly low as the native corky- species in south Florida and Mangrove Buckeye (Junonia evarete) and nectar on flowers in sunny areas and in stemmed passionflower. They roost together in trees south Texas. It has a diagonal This is a large butterfly MacBeach butterfly garden. at night. It’s one of the longest-lived butterflies, living dark line on its folded forewing with lots of eyespots on several months, because it feeds on pollen as well as below. It flies fast in maritime its wings above. The Horace’s Duskywing (Erynnis Horatius) nectar. It’s common in the MacBeach butterfly garden hammocks where blackbead, its common buckeye looks It’s a large spread- and on the dune trail. larval host plant, grows. They similar, but the winged skipper that is are more commonly seen in summer and fall. It mangrove buckeye has the most common Julia Heliconian (Dryas julia) “nectars” (drinks nectar from flowers) in open areas. more orange and can duskywing seen in this This is a long-winged tropical be seen in the area. Females are lighter species. Females are rusty Giant Swallowtail (Papilio cresphontes) mangrove habitat, being subtropical along the brown with more mottled orange and males are bright With a wingspan of 5 inches, coast. Its larval host plant is the black mangrove. markings above. Its orange. Passionflower vines it’s one of Florida’s largest They like sunny open areas to sip nectar on larval host plants are like corky-stemmed butterflies. It is dark with a Spanish needles and other flowers. oaks, particularly live oak. It’s more commonly passionflower are its larval yellow stripe above but seen spring to fall. They stay close to the ground host plant. It is seen around trails most of the year. mostly yellow below. It lays Cassius Blue (Leptotes cassius) to sip nectar in open sunny areas. its eggs on its larval host This is a small butterfly with Gulf Fritillary (Agraulis vanilla) plant, wild lime, that grows in blue wings above. The white Monk Skipper (Asbolis capucinus) It has bright orange above maritime hammocks. It’s common most of the year. and dark markings below A large brown skipper, wings like some other local are seen on its folded wings. they have been White Peacock (Anartia jatrophae) The larval host plants are established in Florida butterflies, but its below wings from Cuba since the are silvery. Passionflower Their showy eyespots make them a variable and include downy photogenic butterfly. It perches milkpea, cowpea and wild 1940s. Its host plants vines like corky-stemmed are palm species, like passionflower are also its close to the ground on its larval plumbago. They can be host plant, frogfruit. Because it’s common most of the year in the cabbage palm. larval host plant. It’s common They perch on leaves all year along trails, around neotropical, it does not tolerate open areas sipping nectar on small flowers like cold weather. It’s common most of the year in open scorpion tail and wild sage. and nectar on wild the nature center and sage and Spanish needles. butterfly garden. areas laying eggs and sipping nectar. John D. MacArthur Beach State Park houses 438 acres of rich subtropical coastal habitat, featuring mangrove estuaries, seagrass Park Guide to meadows, hardwood hammocks, vegetated dunes, beaches, and rock reefs. As a result of this variety of ecosystems, over 45 different Common species of butterflies have been identified in the Park. Only a handful of these are featured in this guide, with the focus of aiding Butterflies identification. If you are interested in a more comprehensive list, the MacArthur Beach Butterfly Species Checklist is available in the Nature Center upon request. All animals, plants, and other resources are protected in Florida’s State Parks. Please take nothing but pictures and memories. For your protection and that of the resources, please stay on designated trails and obey all Park signs. John D. MacArthur Alternate format Beach State Park available upon request. John D. MacArthur Beach State Park 10900 Jack Nicklaus Drive North Palm Beach, FL 33408 Park Office 561 -624-6950 Nature Center 561-624-6952 Beach Outfitters Gift Shop - 561-776-7449 Ext. 101 www.macarthurbeach.org .