Painted Lady
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- This article is about the butterfly. For the architectural style, see Painted Ladies.
| Painted Lady | ||||||||||||||||||||
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 Specimen from England | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Scientific classification | ||||||||||||||||||||
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| Binomial name | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Vanessa (Cynthia) cardui (Linnaeus, 1758) | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Synonyms | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Papilio cardui Linnaeus, 1758 |
The Painted Lady (Vanessa cardui) is a well-known colourful butterfly, known in North America as the Cosmopolite.
It is one of the most widespread of all butterflies, found on every continent except Antarctica. In Australia, V. cardui has a limited range around Bunbury, Fremantle and Rottnest Island. However, its close relative, the Australian Painted Lady (Vanessa kershawi, sometimes considered a subspecies) ranges over half the continent. Other closely related species are the American Painted Lady (Vanessa virginiensis), and the West Coast Lady (Vanessa annabella).
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The Painted Lady occurs in any temperate zone, including mountains in the tropics. The species is resident only in warmer areas, but migrates in spring, and sometimes again in autumn. For example, it migrates from North Africa and the Mediterranean to Britain in May and June, but offspring produced there die in the Autumn.
Painted Lady butterflies are popular for many pre-school classes to raise in schools to demonstrate the life cycle of a butterfly.
The caterpillars feed on a wide variety of host plants of the families Asteraceae, especially Carduus crispus (as implied by the species name cardui - Latin for "of the thistles"). Also, Boraginaceae, Malvaceae (especially hollyhocks and dwarf mallow Malva neglecta), and a number of Fabaceae are eaten. The adults drink nectar from a variety of wildflowers and cultivars, more commonly the favored thistle, butterfly bush (Buddleia), asters, Tickseed sunflowers (Bidens) and zinnias.
[edit] Distinguishing features
- For a key to the terms used see Lepidopteran glossary
In general, the Painted Lady is a large butterfly (wing span 5-9 cm (2 - 2 7/8 in)) identified by the black and white corners of its mainly deep orange, black-spotted wings. It has 5 white spots in the black forewing tips and while the orange areas may be pale here and there, there are no cliean white dots in them. The hindwings carry 4 small submarginal eyespots on dorsal and ventral sides. Those on the dorsal side are black, but in the summer morph sometimes small blue pupils are present in some.
The American Painted Lady (V. virginiensis) is most easily distinguishable by its two large hindwing eyespots on the ventral side. virginiensis also features a white dot within the subapical field of the forewings set in pink on the ventral side, and often as a smaller clean white dot in the orange of the dorsal side too. A less reliable indicator is the row of eyespots on the dorsal submarginal hindwing; virginiensis often has two larger outer spots with blue pupils. The black forewing tips have 4-5 white spots, usually the largest is whitish orange.
The West Coast Lady (V. annabella) does not have obvious ventral eyespots. On the dorsal side, anabella lacks a white dot in the subapical orange found in virginiensis, and is a purer orange color. annabella has a fully orange subapical band and leading edge on the forewing. The submarginal row of hindwing spots in annabella features three or four blue pupils. The two larger pupils in annabella are the inner spots, rather than the outer spots as in corresponding virginiensis.
The Australian Painted Lady (V. kershawi) is quite similar to V. cardui. Its four ventral eyespots are less clearly defined, and it always sports at least three (often four) blue pupil spots on its dorsal hindwing. Caterpillars are found mainly on Ammobium alatum.
[edit] Gallery
 Vanessa cardui, Europe. Spots in black forewing tip all white. No or little blue in hindwing eyespots. |  Young caterpillar |  Older caterpillar |  Drying wings after eclosion |
 Adult at rest |  Underside |  Underside, feeding on Eupatorium |  Painted Ladies from the Chesapeake Bay area, USA |
 Specimen from India |  Specimen from Riga, Latvia |
[edit] References
- Painted Lady Butterfly Vanessa cardui : Large format reference quality photographs
- American Painted Lady Butterfly Vanessa virginiensis : Large format reference quality closeup photographs
- Vanessa cardui (TSN 188601). Integrated Taxonomic Information System. Accessed on 6 February 2006.
- Vanessa virginiensis (TSN 188600). Integrated Taxonomic Information System. Accessed on 6 February 2006.
- Opler, P.A. and A.B. Wright. 1999. Peterson field guide to western butterflies. Houghton Mifflin Co., Boston. 544 pp. [ISBN 0-395-79152-9]
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