The Butterfly At Cafe Caffè

The Rio Grande Valley is well known as one of the best spots in the US to see a wide selection of birds and butterflies, and sitting out in Cafe Caff I get a continuous parade passing through.The Queen's Wreath is in full bloom now and both the hummingbirds and butterflies seem to love it. Yesterday there was a swarm of Yellow Dogface Butterflies, as bright yellow as anyone could dream of. I cannot imagine anything that has a more vibrant yellow color than these small fliers. There must have been twenty of them fluttering around the Cafe, seemingly oblivious to both me and Demi, a few landing on the Hummingbird Feeders but most simply flitting about, when a wondrous thing happened.One flew across the Cafe to the Queen's Wreath and .................... disappeared. One second it was there, the next it was gone. Looking closely at the point where it disappeared I finally saw it. The wings were reflecting the green of the foliage and not the yellow I saw when they were in the sun. What was really amazing though was when I moved closer to try for one more closeup picture, three flew away that I had not even seen.

Are you certain that the yellow and the green specimens are the same?I noticed several differences on the green one:
- Wing spots
- Different shaped wings
- Brown head
- Different shaped antennae tip.You appear to be suggesting that the yellow butterflies appeared green on the ivy, but they actually appear to be difference species.
(Maybe I have misunderstood the point you were making...)

Quite sure. When they flew away as I got too close they were bright yellow again.

Oh - I just realised...
If the main light hitting the butterflies is green (reflected from the leaves) it will lack the red colour component to make yellow.
They will then look yellow under the 'white' light of the sun when they fly off.Edited by Panda, : No reason given.Edited by Panda, : No reason given.Edited by Panda, : No reason given.

Right.

Hi jaran elegant demonstration that the colors of butterflies are due to diffraction patterns in the reflected light from filtering scales rather than colors.Enjoy.Edited by Zen Deist, : clrtyEdited by Zen Deist, : spling

My woods property is greatly blessed and enhanced with flowers that I've never seen before, thanks to climate change and CO2.
It's a jungle back there. I clear a path and soon need to hack through the rasberry and wild rose thorns, etc.Unfortunately, the poison oak likes it too. I'm highly susceptible to it's poison but so far have avoided it. Providentially the Jewel Weed, i.e. touch me nots have a juicy stem which is an antidote to poison oak. They seem to be abundant where the poison oak is. You crush the juicy stem and rub it on arms and legs before and aft encounters with poison oak. It's also good for other types of itching.

Awesome. Thanks for sharing these.

I noticed a similar thing with Stinging Nettles and Dock Leaves: they seem to grow conveniently close together.

Jar, I'm not convinced that the green butterflies on the foliage are the same species as the yellow one in your other photograph. As Panda already pointed out there are some differences between the two, of which the wing form is the most prominent. The trailing edges of the yellow butterfly's wings are waning gibbous, like the moon is between full moon and third quarter. The green one has wing edges in the shape of a crescent.Did you take the picture of the yellow butterfly yourself, or is it a stock picture?Also, in the picture of the green butterfly most of the ambient light is reflected from the white trellis, so the explanation for the green colour having to do with the foliage seems a bit farfetched to me. Perhaps the butterflies' wings are yellow on top and green underneath?

The picture of the one on the dirt is a stock photo but of the same species.

But how about the difference in wing shape? They do not seem the same to me.

There is lots of variation among the Yellow Dogface Butterflies AKA Southern or California or ...BUT, most of the difference in wing shape is the result of what is actually reflected, of environment. For example, the spots can seem bright almost ruby red all the way to brown or umber depending on where the critter is at the time. The "Dog Face" or "Poodle Face" that gives them their common name is actually a pattern in the upper wing that surrounds the spot but on many I cannot make it out at all.The edges of the wings too look entirely different when they appear yellow than when they appear green, and that too seems to be light dependent. The edges seem much smoother normally than they do in the close up of the one on the Queen's Wreath. The difference really surprised me when I saw the closeup.The swarm that came through that day were bright yellow, sitting with wings folded and in flight but I could not get a picture of any showing the yellow before they flew off. Hopefully the next time they visit I'll do better.Remember, I am not a Lepidopterologist and so it is also very possible that the yellow stock photo is not the same species, however the one on my vine is bright yellow when not sitting there and both top and bottom of its wings appear bright yellow.Edited by jar, : disclaimer.

Wow!, that's fierce good camouflage, you'd swear it was a leaf.
Very pretty jar, thanks.Edited by Son Goku, : No reason given.

Um u sure its not Cafe Caffi or Cafi Lately i see less and less butterflies in summer, i wonder if anyone in the green party is noticing this and doing something about it.