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Eastern
Tailed Blue Butterfly - Everes comyntas
Superfamily:
Papilionoidea - True Butterflies
Family: Lycaenidae /
Subfamily: Polyommatinae - Blues
Live adult butterflies photographed in the
wild at Winfield, DuPage County IL USA.
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Eastern Tailed
Blue Butterfly |
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This is a very small
butterfly - with wings closed, in profile, about the size of a U.S.
dime.
Their flight is very quick and erratic, looping and diving, very
difficult to follow. But when they land, on partly cloudy days, it's almost comic to watch them
unfailingly close their wings when the
sun goes under - and open them when it comes out, over and over
again. They usually share space with (and are the same size as) the
Spring /
Summer Azures. |
Eastern Tailed
Blue Butterfly |
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Description: Male is
bright silvery-blue above, female is darker, slate gray shot with
blue, with orange and black hindwing spots near threadlike tails.
Grayish white below with distinct curved rows of gray-black spots;
conspicuous orange, black-edged spots above tails.
Life Cycle: Eggs are laid
in flower stems and buds. Caterpillars are dark green with brown and
lighter stripes on the side. Legumes are the preferred host plants,
especially clover, beans, wild pea and trefoil. Caterpillar
overwinters inside bean and pea pods. Three broods in north, more in
south.
Habitat: Disturbed areas,
fields, meadows, forest glades and fringes..
Range:
Southern Canada to Central America, east of Rocky Mountains.
Irregular spots in the West at lower elevations only.
The
Eastern Tailed Blue is supposedly one of the East's most abundant
butterflies, but here near Chicago, this is not so.
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