Painted Lady Butterflies Develop, Emerge in Time Lapse

Here we see the later life stages of several Painted Lady (Vanessa cardui)Butterflies.

Once the caterpillars are mature, they suspend themselves upside-down, by attaching a body part called the "cremaster" to a silken pad on the twig, much like the way Velcro works.

In about 1 day, the caterpillar sheds its final skin to complete the pupation process. Inside the pupa, the caterpillar has essentially liquified itself into a soup of cells. During the next 12-14 days, metamorphosis takes place - the cells are "re-arranged" and transformed into the adult insect. For most of this process, there is no visible change on the outside, but as the final few days approach, the developing adult butterfly can be seen through the semi-transparent pupal case. The butterfly's wing colors and pattern can be seen to darken. Finally, the fully developed adult separates from the pupal shell about an hour before it emerges, a process called "eclosion".

Once the adult emerges, it takes only a few minutes to expand its wings by pumping a body fluid into the wings' vein structure. After a couple of hours, the fluid dries and hardens, leaving the wings rigid enough propel it in flight. LINK: Youtube

12 of the Most Fascinating Butterflies

Glasswing Butterfly (Greta Oto) is a brush-footed butterfly which wings are transparent. The tissue between the veins of its wings looks like glass. They are found in the range which extends throughout Central America into Mexico. (Link), Via: ODDEE

Man Attacked By Butterfly Swarm

(YouTube Link)

This short video shows a man getting attacked by a swarm of butterflies near Palo Alto, California. LINK: Neatorama

Steampunk butterfly

Steampunk butterfly by DeviantArt's Ursulav, who writes, "Have finally succeeded in sketching one of the clockwork insects present at this location. It appears at a distance to be a common skipper butterfly, but upon closer examination, it became apparent that there had been extensive technological modifications to the creature. LINK

Not a dead leaf

This is the chrysalis of a southeast Asian butterfly - Dichorragia nesimachus nesiotes. The head would be at the right end, the wings are the triangular formation at right center. The "hole" is presumably there as part of the camouflage. LINK

Photo credit.

The Sublime Swallowtail

You may be familiar with the Common Yellow and the Western Tiger, but the Swallowtail family of butterflies is much larger and diverse than you may imagine.

Take a look at some of the less familiar species, along with some stunning photographs, and revisit one or two you have perhaps seen before. LINK

Almost invisible: The incredible Glasswing Butterfly

A butterfly with transparent wings? Surely not. Yet there is a species that exhibits this trait. Take a close look at the incredible Glasswing, an enchanting species that confounds science.

Transparency in nature is not something that has been very well understood. In order to achieve transparency the tissue must not absorb light. Neither can it scatter light, as this is the major obstacle to being see-through. Humans, for example, will never be able to be transparent because they have chemical and biological compounds that all have different refraction. The wings of the glasswing must, therefore, have the same refractive index all the way through them as otherwise this transparency could not possibly occur. It is thought (a postulation at the moment rather than sure fire fact) that the surface of the wing has a covering of protrusions that are so small they can be called submicroscopic. They have a single refractive index and so do not scatter light, so making the wings transparent. LINK

Flowers

I captured this shot by following the Butterfly around until he finally landed. I was persistent. Was taken by a local store in there flower bed area.

A Collection of 18 Beautiful Butterflies & Their Color Palettes

Swallowtails again:



One particular place to find amazing colors in nature is the Butterfly and lucky for us there are 17,500 species of butterflies in the world.

They use their bright colors to ward of predators by tricking them into thinking they are poisonous (some actually are) or by camouflaging themselves into plants or bigger insects. LINK

Extraordinary pictures of the alphabet - spelled out on Butterflies' Wings

Every one of these extraordinary images comes from the brilliant patterns on the wings of moths and butterflies. These designs - each one unique to its species - are used either to attract a mate or for disguise against predators.
Photographer Kjell Sandved has made it his life's work to capture them and create this amazing butterfly alphabet, with every letter from A to Z and every number from 1 to 9. Check these out they are cool. LINK

The Birth OF A ButterFly

A butterfly begins By laying her eggs Out pops a caterpillar Crawling on its legs. Photos showing the progression of the birth.
Here’s how an incredibly beautiful creature is born into this world.
Would be awesome to see this in a time lapse video. LINK