Papilio glaucus – Eastern Tiger Swallowtail

Caterpillar food:  many different tree leaves including Cherry, Alder, Ash, Lilac, Basswood, and Apple

Male Eastern Tiger Swallowtails are yellow with black “tiger” stripes, and in our area can be confused with Canadian Tiger Swallowtails.

Female Tiger Swallowtails can either be yellow and black like the males, or all black.  The dark tiger stripes can usually be seen even on the wings of the black ones – as in this black female seen on 8/8/2005.  It helps to look at them with the light coming from behind.

 

8/10/2009  Eastern Tiger Swallowtail – probably a male – on our driveway.   Males suck up moisture from mud, gravel or mammal scat to collect salts that are used in mating.

 

8/10/2009

 

6/7/2008   Male on common milkweed – above, males have a wide black border on the hindwing, with a few blue spots near the tails.

 

8/8/2005   Female on common milkweed – above, yellow females have a wide blue border on the hindwing

 

 

A few times I’ve seen females that have coloring mid-way between the black and yellow forms.

8/21/2022

 

8/5/2011

unusual tiger swallowtail 8-5-11 6

 

8/5/2011

unusual tiger swallowtail 8-5-11 3

 

8/5/2011

unusual tiger swallowtail 8-5-11 1

 

6/15/2009  I found this early instar Tiger Swallowtail caterpillar on the top of a Wild Black Cherry leaf (Prunus serotina).

Papilio glaucus larva

 

6/20/2009

Papilio glaucus larva

 

6/24/2009

Papilio glaucus larva

 

At this point, it spent much of its time resting on top of one of the leaves – returning to the same leaf each time.  It fastened itself on with silk, and the leaf hung straight down from the branch. It would leave the leaf to eat other leaves – but never ate its resting leaf.  This shows the silk that it used to fasten itself to the leaf.

Papilio glaucus larva

 

6/27/2009   The larva hanging on its leaf

Papilio glaucus larva

 

7/7/2009   Getting ready to pupate

Papilio glaucus larva

 

7/11/2009   The finished pupa

Papilio glaucus pupa

 

On July 27th the pupa darkened

Papilio glaucus pupa

And later that morning the adult emerged.  It was a black female.

Papilio glaucus adult female

The empty chrysalis

Just before releasing her

Papilio glaucus adult female

 

Another life cycle sequence – this time a yellow female – also eating Wild Black Cherry.  The first photo was taken on 7/14/2022, she emerged and was released on 8/25/2022.