''Morpho polyphemus'', the white morpho or Polyphemus white morpho, is a white

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 ...

Mexico Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...

and

Central America Central America ( es, América Central or ) is a subregion of the Americas. Its boundaries are defined as bordering the United States to the north, Colombia to the south, the Caribbean Sea to the east, and the Pacific Ocean to the west. ...

, ranging as far south as

Costa Rica Costa Rica (, ; ; literally "Rich Coast"), officially the Republic of Costa Rica ( es, República de Costa Rica), is a country in the Central American region of North America, bordered by Nicaragua to the north, the Caribbean Sea to the no ...

. As suggested by its name, this is one of the relatively few

Morpho The morpho butterflies comprise many species of Neotropical butterfly under the genus ''Morpho''. This genus includes more than 29 accepted species and 147 accepted subspecies, found mostly in South America, Mexico, and Central America. ''Morph ...

s that is white rather than blue. Some authorities include '' M. luna'', which is also white, as a

subspecies In biological classification, subspecies is a rank below species, used for populations that live in different areas and vary in size, shape, or other physical characteristics (morphology), but that can successfully interbreed. Not all species ...

of ''M. polyphemus''.

Identification

Both the upper and lower wings are bright white, with some small light brown markings. There is a row of small eyespots on the underside of the hindwings.

Host plant

The caterpillar has been known to eat ''

Paullinia pinnata ''Paullinia pinnata'' is a flowering plant species in the genus of ''Paullinia'' found in South America and Africa. The long flexible stems of ''P. pinnata'' are used to poison fish in shallow pools, as described by the English naturalist Henry ...

'' (family

Sapindaceae The Sapindaceae are a family of flowering plants in the order Sapindales known as the soapberry family. It contains 138 genera and 1858 accepted species. Examples include horse chestnut, maples, ackee and lychee. The Sapindaceae occur in tempera ...

) and ''

Inga ''Inga'' is a genus of small tropical, tough-leaved, nitrogen-fixing treesElkan, Daniel. "Slash-and-burn farming has become a major threat to the world's rainforest" ''The Guardian'' 21 April 2004 and shrubs, subfamily Mimosoideae. ''Inga''s l ...

'' (family

Fabaceae The Fabaceae or Leguminosae,International Code of Nomenc ...

Etymology

The species epithet is derived from

Polyphemus Polyphemus (; grc-gre, Πολύφημος, Polyphēmos, ; la, Polyphēmus ) is the one-eyed giant son of Poseidon and Thoosa in Greek mythology, one of the Cyclopes described in Homer's ''Odyssey''. His name means "abounding in songs and lege ...

, a character in Greek mythology, from the small eyespots on the wing. Polyphemus was the one-eyed son of

Poseidon Poseidon (; grc-gre, Ποσειδῶν) was one of the Twelve Olympians in ancient Greek religion and myth, god of the sea, storms, earthquakes and horses.Burkert 1985pp. 136–139 In pre-Olympian Bronze Age Greece, he was venerated as a ch ...

and

Thoosa In Greek mythology, Thoosa (, el, text=Θόωσα, translit=Thóōsa), also spelled Thoösa, was, according to Homer, the sea nymph daughter of the primordial sea god Phorcys, and the mother, by Poseidon, of the Cyclops Polyphemus.Homer, ''Odyss ...

Public domain photo Morpho polyphemus purchased from Bicbugs wikimedia commons

Description

Account by

Hans Fruhstorfer Hans Fruhstorfer (7 March 1866, in Passau, Germany – 9 April 1922, in Munich) was a German explorer, insect trader and entomologist who specialised in Lepidoptera. He collected and described new species of exotic butterflies, especially in Ada ...

in ''Die Gross-Schmetterlinge der Erde'':Fruhstorfer, H. 1913. Family: Morphidae. In A. Seitz (editor), ''Macrolepidoptera of the World'', vol. 5: 333–356. Stuttgart: Alfred Kernen. "''M. polyphemus'' Db. & Hew. (68c) differs from its Brazilian relatives in the chalky white upper surface of both wings with delicate mother-of-pearl gloss, and also in the projecting apex of the forewing and the sharp teeth of the hindwing. On the upper surface the black distal bordering is absent and the discocellular shows only a quite narrow stripe. The ocelli yespotsof the forewing are larger than in '' Morpho catenarius, catenarius'', those of the wing more distinctly white-centred. As '' Morpho luna, luna'' Butler has described an aberration from Mexico with the black spots on both wings unusually well developed. The flight of polyphemus is extremely rapid and irregular, and according to Godman and Salvin the species ascends in Guatemala to 4000 ft.

200 m The 200 metres, or 200-meter dash, is a sprint running event. On an outdoor 400 metre racetrack, the race begins on the curve and ends on the home straight, so a combination of techniques is needed to successfully run the race. A slightl ...

and is often met with near the ground in villages or also high up round the tops of trees in the timber-forest. Distributed from Mexico to Guatemala and Nicaragua, occasionally also occurring in Panama."

References

*Smart, Paul (1976). ''The Illustrated Encyclopedia of the Butterfly World in Color''. London, Salamander: ''Encyclopedie des papillons''. Lausanne, Elsevier Sequoia (French language edition) page 235 fig. 5 (Mexico) and page 235 fig. 10 as ''luna'' Butler (Mexico)

External links

White Morpho
University of Montana Butterflies and Moths of North America pages
NSG Voucher specimen. Photograph of undersideUpperside and underside photographs
Taxonomy Browser

Images of type and other specimens Morpho {{Morphinae-stub