Butterflies 101
Whether you spend days, weeks or years on
Kiawah Island, you are sure to encounter our prettiest,
liveliest, most elusive residents – our butterflies. Naturalists
from the Nature Center count over sixty varieties as at least
occasional visitors. They grace every habitat on the island
– grasses, forests, dunes, marshes, flowers, and trees. At
some point in every day they are here in some form – larva,
caterpillar, chrysalis, or beautifully winged adult. If you
slow down for just a minute or two on your rush to the first
tee, or your rapid bike ride through the woods or even your
walk to your house from your car with a bag of groceries,
you will find them. We do not propose that you get to know
them all, but we have assembled here the most commonly
found varieties. We are also providing you with the tools
needed to see and identify them the next time you care to
try. Please note that our butterflies, like all species, tend to
vary markedly in their location at any given time. Some
seasons will find huge numbers in one environment and very
rare there the next season. Also, many species are limited to
specific host plants and habitats so finding them may prove
a challenge.
When you attempt to identify a particular type of
butterfly, it helps to approach with a little basic knowledge
about their life cycles. Generally speaking, butterflies go
through distinct stages of development collectively knows as
metamorphosis. After mating, the adult female lays her eggs
on a host plant. The eggs will hatch when the conditions
permit – from a few days to even years later. A caterpillar
hatches from the egg and begins to eat the host plant. After
shedding its skin several times it will find a sheltered spot,
suspend itself by silken threads and shed one last time to
form a hardened shell known as a chrysalis or pupa. Later –
days, months or years – a fully developed winged adult will
appear and the cycle will begin again. It is the adults that we
are identifying here.
The Palamedes Swallowtail (Papilio palamedes,
also known as the Laurel Swallowtail) has a wingspan of
about 5 inches. By butterfly standards it is fairly large and
easily recognizable. It has two pairs of wings, forewings
and hind wings. The upper sides of its wings are blackishbrown and both are marked with yellow bands toward the
“Beautiful and graceful, varied and
enchanting, small but approachable,
butterflies lead you to the sunny side of life.
And everyone deserves a little sunshine.”
Jeffrey Glassberg
bottom. They may be our most common butterfly, found
in abundance in all but the winter months. Their habitat is
generally around wet wooded areas near rivers and swamp
forests. Caterpillar hosts include plants of the laurel family
especially the redbay and adult food consists of thistles, blue
flag and azaleas.
The Cabbage Butterfly (Pieris rapae also known
as the Small Cabbage White or White Butterfly) is much
harder to locate. It is only about 2 inches across and its
creamy white color with a couple of small black spots and
mottled black tips on each wing makes it hard to detect.
Th