Butterfly, commonly known as "butterfly, arthropod phylum, insect class, lepidoptera, hammer horn suborder collectively." There are about 14,000 species worldwide, most of which are distributed in the Americas, especially in the Amazon Basin. There are 1200 species in China.
Butterflies are generally brightly colored, there are many stripes on the body, the color is richer, the wings and body have a variety of spots, the largest butterfly wings can reach about 28 to 30 cm, the smallest is only about 0.7 cm.
The main difference between butterflies and moths is that butterflies have a pair of rod-shaped or hammer-shaped antennae on their heads, and the moths have a variety of antennae.
Butterflies are classified as Lepidoptera, and there are tens of thousands of species in the world that fall under this category. From the Cretaceous period onwards, butterflies evolved with and pollinated flowering plants as food, and were the last class of insects in their evolution.
The reason why butterflies are called butterfly. The word butterfly is derived from the old English word buterfleoge and is composed of butere (butter) plus fleoge (flying creature).
There is a long-standing saying that because butterflies like to steal cream and milk, people say that they are elves with colored wings who like to steal cream, so they call it butterfly. The above legend is also reflected in one of the German names of the butterfly, milchdieb, which is equivalent to the English milk-thief (milk thief).
Another explanation is that butter refers to the color of a butterfly; fly is originally a generic reference to flying insects, while the word butterfly may have first referred to a pink butterfly with a sulfur color (closer to cream when closed wings) that originated after the winter in southern Europe. The male's forewings are yellowish in color and carry a warm ray of light when flying, known as butter-colored fly. The word gradually evolved into butterfly and was used to refer to all species of butterflies.
Most of the butterflies are between 5 and 10 cm in size, and the body is divided into head, chest and abdomen; two pairs of wings; and three pairs of feet. On the head there is a pair of hammer-shaped antennae with thickened antennae at the ends and broad wings, with the wings erect on the back when resting. The antennae of butterflies are rod-shaped, and the segments at the ends of the antennae are thick and hammer-shaped. The body and wings are covered with flattened scaly hairs. The abdomen is slender and long.
The largest is the Alexander Queen Bird Wing Butterfly in eastern New Guinea, with a female wingspan of up to 31 cm; the smallest is the Afghan Grey Butterfly, with wingspan of only 7 mm. The mouthparts are lower-mouthed; the feet are walking feet; the wings are lepidons; they belong to total metamorphosis.
The scales on the butterfly's wings not only make the butterfly gorgeous, but also resemble a raincoat for the butterfly. Because the scales of butterfly wings are rich in fat, they can protect them, so even when it rains lightly, butterflies can fly.
After the butterfly larvae bite through the egg shell and hatch out, some species take a break and directly eat the host plant; some species (such as the red-eyed bamboo butterfly) first eat the egg shell and then eat the plant; and some species also need to eat the old skin that molts each time, such as the vegetable powder butterfly and the spotted bean powder butterfly.
The feeding objects of butterfly larvae vary according to the species, most larvae are fond of leaf- and leaf-loving; some species, such as pollen butterflies and orange-spotted pink butterflies, are fond of flower buds; and some species of moths eat tender pods or young fruits, such as pod gray butterflies eat young bean pods, gardenia gray butterflies eat gardenia young fruits. In addition, in the gray butterfly family, there are a few species of larvae that are carnivorous, for example, the gray butterfly is addictive to coffee aphids, and the bamboo aphid gray butterfly feeds exclusively on bamboo aphids, which are rare beneficial insects in butterflies.
Larvae that feed on plant leaves, such as the early stage of the first instar, often nibble on the leaf flesh on the back of the leaf, leaving the upper epidermis, forming a glass window-like transparent spot, and then the larvae eat leaf perforation, or encroach inward from the leaf edge; as the insect grows, the amount of food is also larger and larger. When the density of insect mouths on a plant is large, the whole plant is eaten up.
Most butterflies suck nectar, as far as nectar-sucking butterflies are concerned, they not only suck nectar, but also like to suck nectar of certain specific plants, such as blue butterflies sucking nectar of lily plants; vegetable powder butterflies suck the nectar of cruciferous plants; and leopard butterflies are addicted to nectar of Asteraceae plants, etc.; some butterflies that do not smoke nectar have bamboo-eyed butterflies that suck fig juice; lilac butterflies that smoke sick oaks and poplar acid syrup; and some butterflies can suck the flesh of grapes, which are commonly eaten by butterflies in grape fields.
The activities and habits of butterfly larvae also vary from species to species. From the perspective of activity time, the general type is active in the morning and evening when the sun is oblique. However, some species (such as green worms, etc.) are active during the day, and some species (such as many butterfly larvae) are nocturnal.
From the perspective of the regularity of activities, the feeding and habitat activities of the first-aged larvae of many social species are consistent (I., II. age is more obvious), and they are concentrated together to feed or inhabit, and the Chinese tiger butterfly is an example.
There are some butterflies such as nettle butterflies whose larvae often spit silk into a chaotic web between the nettle branches and leaves in groups of dozens, hiding in them like spiders, so as to defend against foreign enemies, and at the same time feed and roost, quite regular. The habitat of butterfly larvae is generally very hidden, so it is not easy to find individual larvae in the wild.
Some butterfly larvae often have the habit of nesting leaves and living in it, and the method of leaf embellishment varies from insect species to species, with one leaf embellishment, several leaves, each with its own style or technique.
Banana butterfly larvae can stick the edges of banana leaves into a nest and live in seclusion, while rice butterfly often nests with several leaves. Larvae with nesting habits or netting habits, they all feed near the perch, never far out, as soon as there is an alarm, immediately retreat into the nest to hide, which is completely different from the general butterfly habitat habits.
Water is an essential component of the metabolism of biological organisms. Therefore, we can often see butterflies stopping on damp ground to absorb water, especially slightly salty water, which is the most attractive to them to drink. Whenever the sun is shining in the middle of the summer, on the sun,on the sunken mountain road, by the stream, there are all kinds of butterflies gathered there to absorb water.
The total number of recorded butterflies worldwide is about 20,000 species, with China accounting for about 2,153 species, and 18 of the 158 families of lepidoptera. The number of butterflies is most abundant in the Amazon basin of South America, followed by Southeast Asia.
The most beautiful and ornamental butterflies in the world are also mostly produced in South America, Brazil, Peru and other countries. The species that are internationally protected are mostly distributed in Southeast Asia, such as Indonesia, Papua New Guinea and other countries. Different humidity environments and different plant communities are formed in the same area and at different altitudes, and many different butterfly populations are formed accordingly.
Butterflies have 5 types of cone cells, two more than humans, that is, they can feel two colors that we can't name except red, blue, and green.
Butterflies are fully metamorphosed insects, i.e. they go through four stages in their lifetime: eggs, larvae, pupae, and adults.
The eggs of butterflies are generally round or oval, with a waxy shell on the surface to prevent water evaporation, and there are fine holes at one end, which is the passage for sperm to enter. Different species of butterflies have very different eggs in size. Butterflies generally lay their eggs on the leaves of plants that the larvae prefer to eat, preparing food for the larvae.
After the larva hatches, it mainly eats, eating a large number of plant leaves, and the shape of the larvae is diverse, most of them are flesh worms, and a few are caterpillars. Butterflies harm agriculture mainly in the larval stage. As the larvae grow, they generally undergo several molts.
After the larva matures, it will become a pupa, and the larvae will generally fix themselves in a hidden place on the back of the plant leaf, with a few wires, and then directly pupate without a cocoon.
After the pupa matures, it breaks out of the shell of the pupa, but it takes a certain amount of time to dry and harden the wings, at which time the butterfly cannot avoid predators and belongs to the dangerous period.
After the wings are spread, the butterfly can fly, the butterfly's front and back wings are not synchronized and fanned, so the butterfly fluctuates greatly when flying, the posture is beautiful, the so-called "dancing", derived from the flight of the butterfly. Adult butterfly species generally die after mating and laying eggs before winter arrives, but some species migrate to the south for the winter.
In general, male butterflies of butterflies are feathered earlier than females. After that, the male butterflies fly everywhere, looking for the newly feathered female butterflies to chase the tails based on the sexual pheromones emitted by the female butterflies.
Before mating, a marriage proposal process is required, in which the pattern and color of the female butterfly and its pheromones play an important role, in addition, the external genitalia structure must match. A female butterfly that inhabits the leaves, if it has already crossed the tail, when the male butterfly flies, it will spread its wings flat and raise its abdomen high, never take off, that is the female butterfly does not accept the indication of the tail, so the male butterfly flies around for a while, and then flies away; on the contrary, it is the tail.
Sometimes a female butterfly that does not need to cross its tail, when it flies in the air, may encounter several male butterflies chasing courtship, pressing and flying in circles, inextricably separated, rising to the sky together, at this time the female butterfly suddenly carries her wings down, landing rapidly, this escape makes the male butterfly as if lost, do not know where the female butterfly is, so the female butterfly can escape.
The female butterfly's "escape" instinct is interesting. There are also some butterflies such as most species of the family Spp., and the female butterfly grows a variety of post-mating derivatives at the base of the opening of the cross sac after mating, which becomes an obstacle to recropping, which is a major feature of identifying species.
The natural enemies of butterflies are: ants, beetles, birds, flies, lizards, frogs, toads, praying mantises, spiders, wasps, parasitic wasps and so on.
Butterfly wings are like the two wings of an airplane, allowing butterflies to use the air current to fly forward; the colorful patterns on the butterfly wings are amazing. But their colorful wings aren't just about feasting people's eyes. Colorful colors are used to hide, disguise and attract mates.
Some species of butterflies overwinter with their eggs. Such as gray butterflies and line gray butterflies, they use mountain apricots as hosts. Overwintering eggs are laid at the base of dormant buds, which is a clever way to kill two birds with one stone. The first is the well hidden eggs, and then there are the larvae that hatch in the spring and can eat delicious buds almost in place.
Some southern butterflies overwinter as adults, but the survival period depends on the species of butterfly. They tighten their wings to hide in the shelter and come out to sunbathe when there is sun. Some butterflies, such as monarch butterflies, migrate through the winter.
Butterflies that overwinter with larvae are also uncommon
Pupated butterflies can tolerate the cold and cannot be moved to be spotted by predators. Butterflies are good examples of pupae overwintering.
The largest butterfly in the world: native to the Solomon Islands and Papua New Guinea in the southwestern Pacific Ocean, is called the Alexander Birdwing Butterfly, with the largest reaching 360 mm from the left to the right wing.
The most beautiful butterfly: the Goddess of Light butterfly (Helena butterfly, blue Danube butterfly).
The weirdest butterfly: the Kaschenfu ghost beauty butterfly (the strange thing is that it was created by literary code word workers, and its prototype is probably the yin-yang butterfly.) From Cai Jun's thriller suspense novel "Butterfly Cemetery").
The rarest butterfly: the imperial moth yin yang butterfly.
Butterflies flutter only 4 to 10 times per second, butterflies fly with a low frequency of flapping wings, and they travel through the air to our ears, we can't feel it, and we can't hear the sound of their flight.
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