![]() | Narrow-winged Awl (one synonym : Papilio ladon Cramer, 1780) COELIADINAE, HESPERIIDAE, HESPERIOIDEA | (donherbisonevans@yahoo.com) and Stella Crossley |
(Photo: courtesy of Mark Korner, Cairns, Queensland)
This Caterpillar is smooth and yellow, with various black markings, including a dorsal line, and a transverse band between each pair of segments. The head is yellow with two transverse black stripes. It lives on its food plant in a shelter made from a leaf, folded over and held with silk. It feeds on:
living in a partly folded leaf, open ended like a cup. The caterpillar grows to a length of about 5 cms.
The caterpillar pupates in a partly folded leaf, often away from the food plant, secured by threads of silk. The pupa is a patchy brown and white, with a length of about 2 cms.
The male adult butterfly is dark brown with a series of white spots on each forewing. The females have only vestigial white spots.
The undersides are similar to the upper surfaces. The hindwings of both sexes are unusual, in having a recurve along the margin near the tornus. The wing span is about 5 cms.
The eggs are cream coloured and hemispherical. They are laid singly on young shoots of a food plant.
The species is found across south-east Asia and the west Pacific, including
as well as in Australia in:
The species is famous for its extensive migrations, southward some years, and northward in others. This butterfly species is also unique in having nocturnal migrations.
Further reading :
Michael F. Braby,
Butterflies of Australia,
CSIRO Publishing, Melbourne 2000, vol. 1, pp 85-86.
Johan Christian Fabricius,
Historiae Natvralis Favtoribvs,
Systema Entomologiae (1775), pp. 530-531, No. 373.
![]() caterpillar | ![]() butterflies | ![]() Lepidoptera | ![]() moths | ![]() caterpillar |
(updated 30 July 2009, 7 January 2024)