Tag: Lepidoptera
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148/150: Learn more about this Canadian rarity
Animalia: Arthropoda: Insecta: Lepidoptera: Geometridae: Larentiinae: Xanthorhoini: Xanthorhoe clarkeata (Douglas Ferguson, 1987) The Xanthorhoe clarkeata are a newly discovered species of geometrid moth as of 1987. They live primarily on the Haida Gwaii Islands of British Columbia. This species is likely endemic to only these islands, making it a rare and unique species to Canada.…
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116/150: The questionable habits of the Question Mark Butterfly
Animalia: Arthropoda: Insecta: Lepidoptera: Nymphalidae: Nymphalinae: Polygonia: Polygonia interrogationis (Fabricius 1798) When thinking of territorial animals, the first ones that come to mind likely aren’t butterflies. The adult males of the question mark butterfly (Polygonia interrogationis) will defend their territory on trees they have perched on.
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101/150: Not a banana, not a mango, it’s a pawpaw fruit!
Plantae: Magnoliophyta: Magnoliopsida: Magnoliales: Annonaceae: Asimina: Asimina triloba Linnaeus, Dunal What do you get when you cross the taste of a banana with the look and texture of a mango? A pawpaw fruit! Believe it or not, the tropical-looking pawpaw tree, which is native to North America, gives the largest tree berry in all of…
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61/150: Some caterpillars love to eat insects!
animalia: Arthropoda: Insecta: Lepidoptera: Lycaenidae: Miletinae: Feniseca: Feniseca tarquinius (Fabricius, 1793) When thinking of a typical caterpillar, you may picture one happily munching away on leaves. Not all caterpillars, however, feed on plants. The caterpillars of the harvester butterfly (Feniseca tarquinius) are actually insectivorous, meaning they feed on insects.
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44/150: I’ve got black tiger stripes and can be found all over Canada!
animalia: Arthropoda: Insecta: Lepidoptera: Papilionidae: Papilioninae: Papilio: Papilio canadensis (Rothschild & Jordan, 1906) Commonly known as the Canadian Tiger Swallowtail, Papilio canadensis is one of the most well-known butterflies in Canada because of its large size (wingspan of 7-10 cm) and distinctive pattern (yellow with black tiger stripes). They are found in all provinces with…
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14/150: Woolly Bear Caterpillars Surviving Winter
Animalia: Arthropoda: Insecta: Lepidoptera: Lymantriidae: Gynaephora: Gynaephora groenlandica (Homeyer., 1874) Tired of winter? Get some tips on winter survival from the Arctic Woolly Bear caterpillar (Gynaephora groenlandica). Did you know this caterpillar lives up to 7 (some suggest 14) years before pupating into a moth?
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Mr. Warne Goes to Washington
For two weeks in October, Jeremy DeWaard (BIO Collections Director), PhD student Jacopo D’Ercole and myself escaped the confines of BIO and Canada, and traveled to Washington D.C. We packed ourselves into a white Subaru around 6:45am and began the plodding 10 hour journey by car to the District of Columbia, a trip that only…
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Catching Moths In The Night
Hey Folks! Long time no blog. We have been super busy here at BIO in the past few weeks. Between field work, the rare BioBlitz, and the Barcoding Conference, it has been pretty crazy here lately! There will be lots of blogs coming your way from our staff about all these fun topics. I myself…
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rare Arthropods
Hello everyone, this past week at BIO, among many other things going on, we finished our standardized sampling at rare Charitable Research Reserve. This was our second sampling event since we had previously sampled the same sites at rare in the late spring.
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Delving into Darkwoods
For the past few weeks I’ve been fortunate enough to start exploring the insect biodiversity of Canada’s largest privately owned nature conservancy: Darkwoods. Owned by the Nature Conservancy of Canada (NCC), Darkwoods is a 136,000-acre tract of land located near Salmo, British Columbia in the heart of the Selkirk mountain range.