Whites, Yellows, and Sulphurs (lat. Pieridae)

4 species

The Pieridae are a large family of butterflies with about 76 genera containing about 1,100 species, mostly from tropical Africa and tropical Asia with some varieties in the more northern regions of North America. Most pierid butterflies are white, yellow, or orange in coloration, often with black spots. The pigments that give the distinct coloring to these butterflies are derived from waste products in the body and are a characteristic of this family.

species

Gonepteryx rhamni

Common Brimstone

Pieris napi

Green-veined White

Pieris brassicae

Large White

Pieris rapae

Small White

Who belongs here?

Whites, Yellows, and Sulphurs: species (4)

Morphology

The Pieridae have the radial vein on the forewing with three or four branches and rarely with five branches. The forelegs are well developed in both sexes, unlike in the Nymphalidae, and the tarsal claws are bifid, unlike in the Papilionidae. Like the Papilionidae, the Pieridae also have their pupae held at an angle by a silk girdle, but running at the first abdominal segment, unlike the thoracic girdle seen in the Papilionidae. But some species such as the madrone butterfly that belong to this family do not shows the presence of this abdominal silk girdle.

Subfamilies

The Pieridae are generally divided into these four subfamilies:

Dismorphiinae (six genera), mostly Neotropical; this group includes several mimetic species. The host plants are in the family Fabaceae. Pierinae (55 genera), whites, yellows, and orange-tips; many of these species are strongly migratory. Host plants are in the families Capparidaceae, Brassicaceae, Santalaceae, and Loranthaceae. Coliadinae (14 genera), sulphurs or yellows; many of these species are sexually dimorphic. Some, such as Colias, have wing patterns that are visible only under ultraviolet. Pseudopontiinae includes only the genus Pseudopontia, which was formerly considered monotypic. Its type species—formerly the sole species in this subfamily—Pseudopontia paradoxa, is endemic to West Africa. According to the molecular phylogenetic study of Braby et al. (2005), sister group relationships among Pieridae subfamilies are ((Dismorphiinae + Pseudopontiinae) + (Coliadinae + Pierinae)).

Some common species

Brimstone, Gonepteryx rhamni California dogface, Zerene eurydice Catalina orangetip, Anthocharis cethura catalina Cloudless sulphur, Phoebis sennae Clouded yellow, Colias croceus Orange tip, Anthocharis cardamines Psyche butterfly, Leptosia nina

Some pest species

Colias eurytheme, alfalfa butterfly or orange sulphur

Colias philodice clouded sulphur Pieris rapae, small white or cabbage white Pieris brassicae, large white or cabbage white

External links

TOL GloBIS Database Includes type images Pteron In Japanese but binomial names 3 pages of images. Tip Next page. Holarctic Pieridae “Family Pieridae”. Insecta.pro. Pontia protodice, checkered white on the UF / IFAS Featured Creatures Web site BHL Bridges Catalogue of the Papilionidae and Pieridae. Whites & Yellows of Germany

Ancestry graph

phylums
classes
orders
families
species

Further Information

„Whites, Yellows, and Sulphurs“ on wikipedia.org

„Whites, Yellows, and Sulphurs“ on iNaturalist.org

Copyright and source information

This project wouldn’t exist without Wikipedia and iNaturalist! As citizen scientists, we benefit enormously from the community’s shared knowledge. This article uses material from Wikipedia and iNaturalist. The images on this website are licensed under Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International.

This article uses material from the Wikipedia article Pieridae the free encyclopedia Wikipedia which is released under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License). On Wikipedia a list of authors is available.

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