Match the butterfly to its larval food!

Each of the B.C. butterflies pictured below have specific diets when they are young larvae, or caterpillars.

In this game, try to match the adult butterfly to the food plant it eats as a wee caterpillar!

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This is Acmon Blue. It’s adorable and small. What does its caterpillar eat?

Answer: Buckwheat.

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This Green Hairstreak has a colour like nothing else I know in the grassland. What does its caterpillar munch on?

 

Answer: Buckwheat.

It’s a popular caterpillar food! Plus, if you look closely, you’ll see the adult hairstreak is actually perched on a buckwheat plant. 

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Answer: Arabis/Boechera.

These caterpillars love all mustards, especially tumblemustards and Arabis!

Also Also Also: Anyone remember that time we learned about this Arabis plant??

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Answer: Both lupines!

Many caterpillars love a good lupine meal. 

Also also also: Silvery Blues lay eggs on wild legumes (like Lupines), where the eggs are attended to by ants as they feed. After the larvae pupate, they overwinter in ant nests!

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Some plants are really important for native butterflies! Our native buckwheat shrubs, native perennial lupines, and native mustards are all very important, so try to spare them for butterfly habitat whenever you get a chance!

All butterfly specimens were photographed in the Okanagan but occur in Kamloops as well. Photographs by the author in 2018.

 

Info for this article from:

Butterflies of British Columbia by Jon Acorn and Ian Sheldon, and

Butterflies of British Columbia by Crispin S. Guppy and Jon H. Shepard.