Heliconius butterflies: Heliconius ismenius, the Tiger-striped longwing butterfly.

When visiting Guatemala back in 2012, I came across this beautiful bright orange butterfly. It looked very similar to Isabella’s longwing (Eueides Isabella) but due to the top black wing bar being shortened [1], I believe it to be a tiger-striped longwing (Heliconius ismenius). I must have been near the top of the range for this particular species of butterfly, as they range from Ecuador and Venezuela to southern Mexico, Guatemala and Belize [2,3].

Tiger-striped longwing (H.ismenius), Guatemala, 2012.

There are about 40 known species of Heliconius [4] and are sometimes known to be gregarious, so congregate at night to roost together [5]. In their adult stages, they have a long life span of over two months and females’ mate with numerous males and lay a couple eggs under young leaves on the host plant [6].

H.ismenius are part of a Müllerian mimicry ring as Heliconius are unpalatable from feeding on passion flower vines (Passiflora) during their larval stage and display aposematism to advertise this. They solely feed on one host (Passiflora or very closely related plants) during this stage and has co-evolved with them [7]. A strong link was found between mimicry and the behavioural ecology in Heliconius. This link was found in their roosting patterns, as co-mimics were found to roost as a cluster with each more often than in non-mimic groups [5].

As mentioned earlier, I almost mistook my butterfly for an Isabella’s longwing. E.Isabella is also distasteful to predators [8] so I believe it to be in a Müllerian mimic ring with H.ismenius.

Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed this quick info blast! You can read more about another Tiger butterfly here.

  1. Florida Museum. 2019. ID Guide: Orange Butterflies. [online] Available at: https://www.floridamuseum.ufl.edu/exhibits/butterfly-rainforest/id-guide/orange/ [Accessed 1 Jan. 2019].
  2. Keith S. Brown, Jr. 1979. Ecologia Geográfica e Evolução nas Florestas Neotropicais. 2 vols. (Tese apresentada à Universidade Estadual de Campinas como parte das exigências de um Concurso de Livre Docência, area de Ecologia). Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Campinas, Brazil
  3. Ucl.ac.uk. 2019. [online] Available at: https://www.ucl.ac.uk/taxome/lit/brown79/big/p065.gif [Accessed 2 Feb. 2019]
  4. Nhm.ac.uk. 2019. Spotlight: tiger longwing. [online] Available at: http://www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/spotlight-tiger-longwing.html [Accessed 2 Feb. 2019].
  5. Mallet, J. and Gilbert, L. 1995. Why are there so many mimicry rings? Correlations between habitat, behaviour and mimicry in Heliconius butterflies. Biological Journal of the Linnean Society, 55(2), pp.159-180.
  6. Reimanbutterfly.com. 2019. [online] Available at: http://reimanbutterfly.com/butterfly/Heliconius%20ismenius [Accessed 2 Feb. 2019].
  7. de Castro, É., Zagrobelny, M., Cardoso, M. and Bak, S. 2017. The arms race between heliconiine butterflies and Passiflora plants – new insights on an ancient subject. Biological Reviews, 93(1), pp.555-573.
  8. Animalphotos.me. 2019. Isabella Tiger Butterfly. [online] Available at: https://www.animalphotos.me/butterfly/hel-isa.htm [Accessed 2 Feb. 2019].

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