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Pipe-vine Swallowtail
Butterfly.--The figures in the plates obviate the necessity for describing this familiar but most beautiful insect, the glossy blue-green of which flashes all summer long in the sunlight about the verandas over which the Aristolochia spreads the shade of its great cordate leaves. Expanse, 3.75-4.25 inches.
Early Stages.--The caterpillar feeds upon the leaves of Aristolochia sipho (the Dutchman's-pipe) and Aristolochia serpentaria, which abound in the forest lands of the Appalachian region.
Philenor is always abundant during the summer months in the Middle Atlantic States, and ranges from Massachusetts to Arizona, into southern California and southward into Mexico. It is double-brooded in western Pennsylvania, and the writer has found females ovipositing as late as October. The caterpillars are familiar objects about houses on which the Aristolochia is grown as an ornamental vine.