I have been curious about the creamy-colored, innocuous-looking butterflies I often see around here.  I sometimes spot one fluttering among the plants by the road.  Or I may notice a couple of them flying in small circles around each other until one heads off in another direction.

     These bland-looking little butterflies are called cabbage whites.  And they are one of the commonest, if not the commonest, butterfly in America.  I was surprised to learn that they are not native to North America but were accidentally introduced here from Europe in about 1860.  They spread quickly and now are common throughout America.  As far as I know, the cabbage white does not cause problems in ecosystems in which it has been introduced, and it is not considered an invasive speces.   It is, however, considered a pest by growers of cabbage and other mustard family crops.  Evidently, the cabbage white really does like cabbage; at least the caterpillar form does.

     The cabbage white’s creamy upperside is accented by black-tipped forewings.  And it is easy to distinguish a male from a female;  the male has a single black spot in the center of each forewing, and the female has two.  The underwings of both sexes are yellowish with black speckles. 

     Adult cabbage whites are diurnal, with mid-day the time they are most frequently seen flying.  Some researchers add that cabbage whites may also fly during the night’s latest hours and then cease at dawn.  And these non-showy creatures can be seen in just about any open spaces–fields, gardens, roadsides, waste places, parks, and cities.  Adult cabbage whites get their food from flower nectar.  Among their favorites are dandelions, purple loosestrife, red clover, asters, and mint.

     Cabbage whites are among the hardiest of butterflies.  They are one of the first species to emerge from their chrysalis in the early spring, as early as late February, and they fly until mid-November or until the first hard freeze. 

     The cabbage white starts life as an egg laid on the underside of a leaf of a host plant.  Then, when the egg hatches (which can be pretty much anytime from late spring to late summer), and the caterpillar emerges, it begins eating immediately from the underside of the plant where it hatched.  As it matures, the caterpillar begins to eat the leaf’s  upperside.  Looking rather leaf-like itself, the caterpillar rests along the leaf’s veins!  The caterpillar grows rapidly and molts (sheds its skin) five times before it becomes a chrysalis.  The chrysalis hibernates over the winter and, in the early spring, hatches into an adult butterfly.  

     The cabbage white’s predators include birds and such insects as ants, mantids, and beetles.–April Moore  

adult cabbage white butterfly--photo by Will Cook

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

a cabbage white in caterpillar form

This entry was posted on Wednesday, August 17th, 2011 at 8:01 am and is filed under Insights and Visions on the State of the Earth. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.