''Parides iphidamas'', the Iphidamas cattleheart or Transandean cattleheart, is a species of

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 biogeogra ...

butterfly Butterflies are winged insects from the lepidopteran superfamily Papilionoidea, characterized by large, often brightly coloured wings that often fold together when at rest, and a conspicuous, fluttering flight. The oldest butterfly fossi ...

in the family

Papilionidae Swallowtail butterflies are large, colorful Butterfly, butterflies in the family Papilionidae, and include over 550 species. Though the majority are tropical, members of the family inhabit every continent except Antarctica. The family includ ...

Subspecies

* ''P. i. iphidamas'' (Fabricius, 1793) (southern

Mexico Mexico, officially the United Mexican States, is a country in North America. It is the northernmost country in Latin America, and borders the United States to the north, and Guatemala and Belize to the southeast; while having maritime boundar ...

Panama Panama, officially the Republic of Panama, is a country in Latin America at the southern end of Central America, bordering South America. It is bordered by Costa Rica to the west, Colombia to the southeast, the Caribbean Sea to the north, and ...

) * ''P. i. ayabacensis'' (Joicey & Talbot, 1918) (southern

Ecuador Ecuador, officially the Republic of Ecuador, is a country in northwestern South America, bordered by Colombia on the north, Peru on the east and south, and the Pacific Ocean on the west. It also includes the Galápagos Province which contain ...

to northern

Peru Peru, officially the Republic of Peru, is a country in western South America. It is bordered in the north by Ecuador and Colombia, in the east by Brazil, in the southeast by Bolivia, in the south by Chile, and in the south and west by the Pac ...

) * ''P. i. calogyna'' (Rothchild & Jordan, 1906) (western Ecuador) * ''P. i. elatos'' (Rothchild & Jordan, 1906) (northwestern

Colombia Colombia, officially the Republic of Colombia, is a country primarily located in South America with Insular region of Colombia, insular regions in North America. The Colombian mainland is bordered by the Caribbean Sea to the north, Venezuel ...

) * ''P. i. gorgonae'' Vélez & Salazar, 1991 (Colombia) * ''P. i. phalias'' (Rothchild & Jordan, 1906) (central Colombia) * ''P. i. teneates'' (Rothchild & Jordan, 1906) (northeastern Colombia to northwestern

Venezuela Venezuela, officially the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, is a country on the northern coast of South America, consisting of a continental landmass and many Federal Dependencies of Venezuela, islands and islets in the Caribbean Sea. It com ...

)

Description

Parides iphidamas - Cattlehearth Butterfly-1

''Parides iphidamas'' has a

wingspan The wingspan (or just span) of a bird or an airplane is the distance from one wingtip to the opposite wingtip. For example, the Boeing 777–200 has a wingspan of , and a wandering albatross (''Diomedea exulans'') caught in 1965 had a wingsp ...

of about . The dorsal sides of the forewings are black, with a broad green and white spots (completely white in females), while the dorsal sides of the hindwings show a broad red band or spot. Along the edges there are many small yellow spots. The undersides of the wings are black with a white band on the forewings and several pink patches on the hindwings.Brian McAndrew, ''Butterflies'' – James Lorimer & Co. Ltd Publishers The body of the butterfly is black with red dots. The poisonous caterpillars are chocolate brown, with white or brown protrusions resembling thorns. The host plants are various toxic '' Aristolochia'' species ('' A. cordiflora'', '' A. maxima'', '' A. odoratissma'', '' A. pilosa'', '' A. ringens'', and '' A. tonduzii'').

Description from Seitz

P. iphidamas. Male: tibiae and 1 segment of the tarsi thickened and covered with fine hairs. Female :forewing at the margin less deep black than in '' P. erithalion''. Mexico to Ecuador and North Venezuela. A common species, which is not easy to distinguish from ''P. erithalion'' and '' P.lycimenes'', and is consequently often mistaken for them. — ''iphidamas'' F. (= ''panares'' Gray, ''achelous'' Hopff., ''incandescens'' Btlr.) is the Central American form. Male: forewing distally not transparent; the green area usually reduced, always enclosing one or two white spots; often a white spot in the cell; band of the hindwing gradually widened posteriorly, a narrow spot behind the 2.median. Female: cell-spot on the forewing large, usually some smallspots beyond the cell; the spot before the 2.median smaller than the preceding one, or obliquely cut off towards the base; band of the hindwing almost unicolorous bright red, its inner margin evenly curved. South Mexico to Panama. — ''phalias'' R & J. (4b). Male: the green area widest posteriorly, reaching to the hindmargin; hindwing with three red spots separate from the cell. Female: forewing slightly transparent at the apex: cell-spot very large; the spot before the 1.median much larger than the preceding one; band of the hindwing very broad, pale on the inner side. Colombia: Magdalena Valley and Cordillera of Bogota. —''elatos'' R & J. Male : the green area smaller than in the preceding subspecies; hindwing with three small red spots. Cauca Valley. — ''calogyna'' R. & J. (4b).Male: forewing exteriorly somewhat more thickly scaled than in ''phalias'' and ''elatos'', usually a white spot before the 2.median; hindwing with 3 small red spots, close together. Female: the spot before the 1.median of the forewing larger than the preceding one; band of the hindwing bright red, its inner margin usually white. West Ecuador and west coast of Colombia. —''teneates'' R.&J. Male : the green area narrow, separated from the cell, usually enclosing one or two white spots. Female not known with certainty. North Venezuela and North Colombia. File:Macrolepidoptera15seit 0017.jpg, Seitz

Description from Rothschild and Jordan(1906)

A full description is provided by Rothschild, W. and Jordan, K. (1906)

Distribution

This species is native to the Central and

South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a considerably smaller portion in the Northern Hemisphere. It can also be described as the southern Subregion#Americas, subregion o ...

. It occurs from southeastern

Costa Rica Costa Rica, officially the Republic of Costa Rica, is a country in Central America. It borders Nicaragua to the north, the Caribbean Sea to the northeast, Panama to the southeast, and the Pacific Ocean to the southwest, as well as Maritime bo ...

, and

Habitat

It is common in various habitats, ranging from open lowlands to wooded areas and tropical forests from sea level to . Females mainly occur where the caterpillar host plant are located, in forest clearings and along forest edges.

Taxonomy

''Parides iphidamas'' is a member of the ''anchises''

species group In biology, a species complex is a group of closely related organisms that are so similar in appearance and other features that the boundaries between them are often unclear. The taxa in the complex may be able to hybridize readily with each oth ...

Edwin Möhn, 2007 ''Butterflies of the World'', Part 26: Papilionidae XIII. ''Parides'' Verlag Goecke & Evers Verlag Goecke & Evers The members are *'' Parides anchises'' *'' Parides cutorina'' *'' Parides erithalion'' *''Parides iphidamas'' *'' Parides panares'' *'' Parides phosphorus'' *'' Parides vertumnus''