In this research paper I am going to discuss the life cycle of butterflies, in particular, the Tiger Swallowtail butterfly. I will discuss the basic life cycle of butterflies that every butterfly goes through in some capacity before I move on to discuss the Tiger Swallowtail itself in more detail.
Every butterfly and every moth follows a similar circle of life. The parent insect lays the eggs in a location that varies with species. The eggs then hatch into a caterpillar or other type of larva. The larva stuffs itself with food from the plants that its species eats the most of, called host plants. It then weaves or otherwise produces itself a chrysalis or a cocoon. After a given period of time, the chrysalis hatches, and out crawls a young butterfly. This butterfly will go on to mate and, with its mate, will produce egg, which will continue the circle of life. It is good to know that this circle of life varies from species to species of butterfly and moth, and so I am now going to take a deeper dive into the life cycle of Tiger Swallowtail butterflies in particular. (Life Cycle of Butterflies and Moths)
The first stage in the circle of life for Tiger Swallowtails is, of course, the egg stage. Eggs are laid by the adults on the host plant of milkweed. The eggs are small and green. They hatches just seven days after being laid. (How to raise tiger swallowtail butterflies, 2023)
Once the eggs of the Tiger Swallowtail hatch, out comes a fairly large caterpillar. Its color is a lime green. The caterpillar will hatch and molt (shed its skin) several times before it creates its cocoon. During this time, the caterpillar is stuffing itself full of milkweed primarily, but they will also eat the leaves of cherry trees, yellow poplar trees, magnolia trees, and certain types of ash trees. It takes roughly three to four weeks from the eggs hatching to when the caterpillar spins its cocoon, and during that time it is stuffing itself to be prepared to pupate.
The caterpillar will turn brown when it is ready to pupate and form its chrysalis. Most swallowtails attach themselves to a stick and then spin their chrysalis there, and the Tiger Swallowtail are no exception to this general rule. The chrysalis will sit there for 10-20 days as long as it is warm outside; if it is cold than the chrysalis will wait until spring to hatch into a butterfly. (ButterflyGardeningAndConservation.com, Swallowtail Butterflies)
When the butterfly hatches, it will hang by the chrysalis for a few hours to let its wings dry out so that it will be able to fly. Before I talk about what the butterflies do now that they are adults, let me describe the appearance of Tiger Swallowtails. First we have the males. They are mostly yellow, but they have a black edge around their wings. There are black markings on the front of the wings and the actual body of the butterfly. They also have a very small blue marking at the bottom of their wings. They also have their swallowtails that they get their namesake from, which are little projections off the very back tip of their wings. There are two different patterns that the females can have on their wings. The yellow female tiger swallowtails look very similar to their male counterparts, but the blue markings are much larger on the females. There is another color pattern that the female tiger swallowtails can have that looks completely different from the other colors. It is a brown color with the same black pattern that the others have. It is much more subtle though, because black stands out less on brown than on yellow. They have the same blue pattern as the yellow females, but it is more pale and closer to white than the one on the yellow butterflies. (Eastern Tiger Swallowtail Butterflies)
The swallowtails mate quickly after they hatch from their chrysalises because their lifespan is only about two weeks, so if they don’t mate and lay eggs quickly, then they will miss their only opportunity to do so. They lay their eggs on milkweed or the other host plants mentioned above before they die, and so the circle of life continues.
I covered the life cycle of swallowtail butterflies in this research paper. I talked about the basic life cycle of almost all butterflies, and then I went into some of the traits particular to the Tiger Swallowtail, and then I also discussed their appearance. It is kind of sad that butterflies spend all that time preparing for adult life, only to die within two weeks, but that’s the way God made them, so it’s okay.
Works Cited
Opler, Paul. “Life Cycle of Butterflies and Moths.” The Children’s Butterfly Site. Metalmark, [no date listed]. Web. 11/29/2023. [https://www.kidsbutterfly.org/life-cycle].
“Tiger Swallowtail – Papilio glaucus.” ButterflyGardeningAndConservation.com. ButterflyGardeningAndConservation.com, [no date listed]. Web. 11/29/2023. [http://www.butterflygardeningandconservation.com/butterfly/st/tiger.php].
“How to raise tiger swallowtail butterflies.” Rooted Wings. Amazon,8/6/2023. Web. 11/29/2023. [https://rootedwingsco.com/how-to-raise-tiger-swallowtail- butterflies/].
“Eastern Tiger Swallowtail Butterfly.” Butterflies At Home. ButterfliesAtHome.com,
[no date listed]. Web. 11/29/2023. [https://www.butterfliesathome.com/tiger-swallowtail- butterfly.htm].