The Mauritian friar (''Amauris phoedon'') is a species of

nymphalid The Nymphalidae are the largest family of butterflies, with more than 6,000 species distributed throughout most of the world. Belonging to the superfamily Papilionoidea, they are usually medium-sized to large butterflies. Most species have a red ...

butterfly Butterflies are insects in the macrolepidopteran clade Rhopalocera from the Order (biology), order Lepidoptera, which also includes moths. Adult butterflies have large, often brightly coloured wings, and conspicuous, fluttering flight. The ...

in the Danainae subfamily. It is

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found elsew ...

Mauritius Mauritius ( ; french: Maurice, link=no ; mfe, label=Mauritian Creole, Moris ), officially the Republic of Mauritius, is an island nation in the Indian Ocean about off the southeast coast of the African continent, east of Madagascar. It incl ...

. Adults have been recorded imbibing exudations from the ends of broken branches of ''

Tournefortia argentea ''Heliotropium arboreum'' is a species of flowering plant in the borage family, Boraginaceae. It is native to tropical Asia including southern China, Madagascar, northern Australia, and most of the atolls and high islands of Micronesia and Polyn ...

'' lying on the ground, presumably for the

pyrrolizidine alkaloid Pyrrolizidine alkaloids (PAs), sometimes referred to as necine bases, are a group of naturally occurring alkaloids based on the structure of pyrrolizidine. Pyrrolizidine alkaloids are produced by plants as a defense mechanism against insect he ...

s that may be present in the exudations. The larvae feed on ''

Tylophora asthmatica ''Tylophora'' is a genus of climbing plant or vine, first described as a genus in 1810. It is native to tropical and subtropical Asia, Africa, and Australia. Most of the species are perennial lianas. The name is derived from the Ancient Greek ...

''.

References

Seitz, A. ''Die Gross-Schmetterlinge der Erde'' 13: Die Afrikanischen Tagfalter. Plate XIII 24
misspelling ''phaedon''

Sources

Amauris Insects of Mauritius Endemic fauna of Mauritius Butterflies described in 1798 Butterflies of Africa Taxonomy articles created by Polbot {{Danainae-stub