Male and Female Tiger Swallowtails

We’ve had a good year for tiger swallowtails in our area. They seem to be the most numerous butterflies around but maybe it’s just that they are the largest of our native butterflies. Most of the host plants are trees. I like to think that the tulip poplars in the forest behind our house have been full of tiger swallowtail caterpillars this year although I haven’t seen any sign of them. They are big trees and the caterpillars impact the tree very little.

I took lots of tiger swallowtail pictures earlier in the season. Now I have made a game for myself trying to find a male and female butterfly close enough together to be in the same picture. The females are the ones with the blue dust on their hind wings. The males have no blue.

The best of the side-by-side pictures is the one below!