''Morpho rhetenor'', the Rhetenor blue morpho, is a

Neotropical The Neotropical realm is one of the eight biogeographic realms constituting Earth's land surface. Physically, it includes the tropical terrestrial ecoregions of the Americas and the entire South American temperate zone. Definition In bioge ...

butterfly of the family

Nymphalidae 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 ...

. It is found in

Suriname Suriname (; srn, Sranankondre or ), officially the Republic of Suriname ( nl, Republiek Suriname , srn, Ripolik fu Sranan), is a country on the northeastern Atlantic coast of South America. It is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the north ...

French Guiana French Guiana ( or ; french: link=no, Guyane ; gcr, label=French Guianese Creole, Lagwiyann ) is an overseas departments and regions of France, overseas department/region and single territorial collectivity of France on the northern Atlantic ...

Brazil Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...

Peru , image_flag = Flag of Peru.svg , image_coat = Escudo nacional del Perú.svg , other_symbol = Great Seal of the State , other_symbol_type = Seal (emblem), National seal , national_motto = "Fi ...

Ecuador Ecuador ( ; ; Quechua: ''Ikwayur''; Shuar: ''Ecuador'' or ''Ekuatur''), officially the Republic of Ecuador ( es, República del Ecuador, which literally translates as "Republic of the Equator"; Quechua: ''Ikwadur Ripuwlika''; Shuar: ''Eku ...

Colombia Colombia (, ; ), officially the Republic of Colombia, is a country in South America with insular regions in North America—near Nicaragua's Caribbean coast—as well as in the Pacific Ocean. The Colombian mainland is bordered by the Car ...

, and

Venezuela Venezuela (; ), officially the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela ( es, link=no, República Bolivariana de Venezuela), is a country on the northern coast of South America, consisting of a continental landmass and many islands and islets in th ...

Description

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 ...

describes: "''M. rhetenor'', already named by Cramer the 'blue elongate Atlas butterfly', has the apex of the forewing more produced than any other Morphid species; a characteristic, however, that partially disappears in the female, which more resembles that of '' cypris''. The male is one of the most brilliantly glossy species and has only a quite inconsiderable black apical spot and a white costal patch on the forewing. The under surface is noteworthy for the contrast between the black basal area and a brown distal region, which are separated by a median band of a more or less pure white and of varying extent according to the locality. Both wings beneath show brown rounded eye-spots entirely without white pupils."

Sex difference

''Morpho rhetenor'' is

sexually dimorphic Sexual dimorphism is the condition where the sexes of the same animal and/or plant species exhibit different morphological characteristics, particularly characteristics not directly involved in reproduction. The condition occurs in most ani ...

. The female (shown in the Seitz plate below) is bigger than the bright blue male and has a dark-brown upperside with a lighter brown outer edge. There is a central yellow area tapering into a triangle and isolated patches as it crosses the forewings and a separate chain of yellow spots crosses the forewings and hindwings.

Biology

The

larva A larva (; plural larvae ) is a distinct juvenile form many animals undergo before metamorphosis into adults. Animals with indirect development such as insects, amphibians, or cnidarians typically have a larval phase of their life cycle. The ...

feeds on ''

Palmae The Arecaceae is a family of perennial flowering plants in the monocot order Arecales. Their growth form can be climbers, shrubs, tree-like and stemless plants, all commonly known as palms. Those having a tree-like form are called palm trees ...

'' and '' Macrolobium

bifolium A bifolium is a quartic plane curve with equation in Cartesian coordinates: :(x^2 + y^2)^2 = ax^2y. Construction and equations Given a circle C through a point O, and line L tangent to the circle at point O: for each point Q on C, define ...

''.

Behaviour

In 1913, Fruhstorfer wrote: "

orma Orma may refer to: * Orma people * Orma language * Orma, Pella, a village in the municipality Almopia, northern Greece * Orma Marble Palace, situated at Kothakulangara * Orma Film Festival * Orma, Tibet * ''Orma'' (film), directed by K. K. Ra ...

''eusebes'' Fruhst. inhabits the Amazon region, where

Michael Michael may refer to: People * Michael (given name), a given name * Michael (surname), including a list of people with the surname Michael Given name "Michael" * Michael (archangel), ''first'' of God's archangels in the Jewish, Christian an ...

has observed it at Obidos in August and September, and Dr. Hahnel at Iquitos and Jurimaguas. According to Dr. Hahnel (Iris 1890, p. 235) ''eusebes'' always flies at a great height and energetically, mounting from 3 to 6 m. with an undulating flight, and can only occasionally be attracted to fly down on to wings of ''

Morpho menelaus The Menelaus blue morpho (''Morpho menelaus'') is one of thirty species of butterfly in the subfamily Morphinae. Its wingspan is approximately , and its dorsal forewings and hindwings are a bright, iridescent blue edged with black, while the ven ...

'' laid on the ground. The female settles on wet places on the banks of rivers (a habit which I also observed in '' M. anaxibia'' in Sta. Catharina). When disturbed they only fly away slowly, in contrast to the males. The males emit a smell of sulphur (Hahnel 1.c. p. 308)."

Etymology

Rhetenor is a literary reference. In Ovid's ''

Metamorphoses The ''Metamorphoses'' ( la, Metamorphōsēs, from grc, μεταμορφώσεις: "Transformations") is a Latin narrative poem from 8 CE by the Roman poet Ovid. It is considered his ''magnum opus''. The poem chronicles the history of the wo ...

'', Rhetenor was a companion of

Diomedes Diomedes (Jones, Daniel; Roach, Peter, James Hartman and Jane Setter, eds. ''Cambridge English Pronouncing Dictionary''. 17th edition. Cambridge UP, 2006.) or Diomede (; grc-gre, Διομήδης, Diomēdēs, "god-like cunning" or "advised by ...

Subspecies

*''Morpho rhetenor rhetenor'' *''Morpho rhetenor cacica'' (Staudinger, 1876) *'' Morpho rhetenor helena'' (Staudinger, 1890) File:SeitzFA2.jpg, Plate from Seitz File:Morphorhetenorcacica.JPG, ''Morpho rhetenor cacica'', Museum Wiesenbad

References

* Le Moult (E.) & Réal (P.), 1962-1963. ''Les Morpho d'Amérique du Sud et Centrale'', Editions du cabinet entomologique E. Le Moult, Paris. *Paul Smart, 1976 ''The Illustrated Encyclopedia of the Butterfly World in Color''. London, Salamander: ''Encyclopedie des papillons''. Lausanne, Elsevier Sequoia (French language edition) page 232 fig.1(Guyana) and page 233 fig.6 ''M. r. helena'' Staudinger, 1890, female (Peru) and fig. 10 ''M. r. helena'' male (Peru).

External links

"''Morpho'' Fabricius, 1807"
at Markku Savela's ''Lepidoptera and Some Other Life Forms''

Images of type and other specimens.
www.butterflycorner.net
(English/German)
NSG
Photograph of underside. {{Taxonbar, from=Q140041 Morpho Nymphalidae of South America Butterflies described in 1775 Lepidoptera of Brazil Lepidoptera of Ecuador Lepidoptera of Venezuela Lepidoptera of Peru Lepidoptera of Colombia Lepidoptera of French Guiana Fauna of Suriname Taxa named by Pieter Cramer