European Peacock Butterfly
Lat. “Aglais io“
species
of family
“Brush-footed Butterflies“
1 species
Aglais io, the European peacock, more commonly known simply as the peacock butterfly, is a colourful butterfly, found in Europe and temperate Asia as far east as Japan. Formerly classified as the only member of the genus Inachis (the name is derived from Greek mythology, meaning Io, the daughter of Inachus). It should not be confused or classified with the “American peacocks” in the genus Anartia; these are not close relatives of the Eurasian species. The…
Characteristics
The butterfly has a wingspan of 50 to 55 millimetres (2 to 2+1⁄8 in). The base colour of the wings is a rusty red, and at each wingtip it bears a distinctive, black, blue and yellow eyespot. The underside is a cryptically coloured dark brown or black. There are two subspecies: A. io caucasica (Jachontov, 1912), found in Azerbaijan, and A. io geisha (Stichel, 1908), found in Japan and the Russian Far East.
Natural history
The peacock can be found in woods, fields, meadows, pastures, parks, and gardens, from lowlands up to 2,500 metres (8,200 ft) elevation. It is a relatively common butterfly, seen in many European parks and gardens. The peacock male exhibits territorial behaviour, in many cases territories being selected en route of the females to oviposition sites. The butterfly hibernates over winter before laying its eggs in early spring, in batches of up to 400 at a time. However, recent studies in Belgium have shown that peacock butterflies reproduce in two periods: early spring and early summer, and a possible third period in autumn. They found that peacock butterflies show flight peaks in early July and early August to early October, with the emergence of butterflies with good-conditioned wings, which shows signs of new offspring. The olive green eggs are ribbed. They are laid on both the upper parts and the undersides of leaves of nettle species and hops. The caterpillars hatch after about a week. They are shiny black with six rows of barbed spikes and a series of white dots on each segment. The chrysalis may be either grey, brown or green, and may have a blackish tinge. The caterpillars grow up to 42 millimetres (1+5⁄8 in) in length. The primary food plants of European peacock larvae are stinging nettle (Urtica dioica), hop (Humulus lupulus), and the small nettle (Urtica urens). The adult butterflies drink nectar from a wide variety of flowering plants, including buddleia, willows, dandelions, wild marjoram, danewort, hemp agrimony, and clover; they also use tree sap and rotten fruits.
Taxonomy
Aglais io was formerly classified as the only member of the genus Inachis (the name is derived from Greek mythology, meaning Io, the daughter of Inachus). It should not be confused or classified with the “American peacocks” in the genus Anartia; while belonging to the same family as the European peacock, Nymphalidae, the American peacocks are not close relatives of the Eurasian species. Io is a figure in Greek mythology. She was a priestess of Hera in Argos.
See also
Anglewing butterflies Peacock butterflies (genus Anartia) Peacock pansy (Junonia almana)
External links
Peacock (Inachis io) from UK Butterflies HD video of Peacock and Vanessa butterflies Peacock page, Aglais io from the Butterfly Conservation Inachis io, Arkive Inachis io, Learn about Butterflies Peacock - Inachis io, Captain’s European Butterfly Guide
Ancestry Graph
Further Information
Copyright
This article uses material from the Wikipedia article Aglais io the free encyclopedia Wikipedia which is released under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License). On Wikipedia a list of authors is available.