Hello! I was hoping maybe some of you lepidopterists out there could ID these butterflies....there's the larger ones, and then the hard-to-see little powder-blue ones...this pic was taken while rafting the Mulberry River in Western Arkansas. Thanks for any help ya'll!
My guess would be that they are Tiger Swallowtails. In the south, there is a black form of the female that looks like this. If you can crop and blow up the one where you can see the underside of the wings, it will be easier to tell. I'll pop over to the butterfly forum and put a link here to bring in the real experts!
I'm going to guess again. You may have more than one kind of swallowtail. The yellow and black one and the one with the yellow underside might be the Giant Swallowtail and the black and blue ones could be one of several kinds of swallowtails - Spicebush, Black, or the female Tiger. We'll see when the real experts get here!
Well, ya'll are quite helpful! I'll try to post some blown up pics....thanks again for your replies!
Let me see if I can get this one up there...
They're so beautiful! I think the black and yellow one on the far left and the one with is wings closed where the underside is yellow are Giant Swallowtails.
The others appear to be Spicebush Swallowtails. I thought at first that it was the black form of the Tiger Swallowtail, but they only have one row of orange spots on the underside of the wing, and the one with his wing closed appears to have two rows like the Spicebush.
Here is kind of cool website. At the bottom of the Black Swallowtail, it lists the others that are similar in appearance, you can check for yourself against all your photos. http://bugguide.net/node/view/2636
Thanks all for all the help! I'm going to the International Butterfly Festival in June, at the top of Mt. Magazine (the tallest point between the Rockies and the Appalachians:about half-an-hour from where I live in Western Arkansas), where I've read there are 91 species, including the Diana Fritillary, which I guess is rare? Anyhow, now I'll at least know two species....Thanks all!
