2024 May 13 Canadian Yellow Swallowtail

 

This Canadian Yellow Swallowtail overwintered on our porch emerged May 13, 2024.

Yesterday I got a text from Carli that the Swallowtail had emerged from the chrysalis that we had in a butterfly tent on the porch all winter. She released it right away, but got some good photos before she did. 

At the end of last summer, we witnessed the female Swallowtail laying eggs on our Sweet Bay Magnolia tree. That’s when I realized we had a larval host plant right off the porch! We took in the eggs and the funniest looking caterpillar came out. It first looked like bird poop. Then, when it molted, it looked like a gooofy goober with yellow horns that protruded when disturbed. I’ll see if I can find the pictures.

The egg on the Sweet Bay Magnolia leaf. August 13, 2023. 

August 26, 2023. Bird poop looking caterpillar. Good disguise.

After a molt. Weirdo.

Extra goofy-looking weirdo. September 1. It didn’t move around much after this. You can see a kind of molt mat fuzz around it.

I think this is the chrysalis it made. It looked like the nub of the Sweet Bay tree branch. Fall 2023.

Carli wanted to see the butterfly in our butterfly book. I found it and we were surprised to see the markings more closely matched the Canadian Swallowtail Papilio canadensis than the Eastern Tiger Swallowtail Papilio glacis. In the book, the range hits the north end of Lake Erie, but not Cleveland. I wonder how rare this beautiful creature is here in Ohio!

A still from the video to show the underside.

Pretty!!

The range of the Canadian Swallowtail!

Markings of the Canadian Swallowtail. Book reference “Butterflies of North America” by Jim P. Brock & Ken Kaufman

Compare to Eastern Tiger Swallowtai below.