December Anise Swallowtail

Today we had two anise swallowtails (Papilio zelicaon) eclose from presumably diapausing chrysalises. 

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This year in particular, we have been noticing a lot of bizarre occurrences in nature that have been hinting at a prolonged fall and a very early spring. Not only are annual flowers blooming and deciduous trees losing their leaves and inflorescing simultaneously, but a number of our lepidopteran pets have been going through some off-sync life cycles such as our anise swallowtails (Papilio zelicaon) eclosing haphazardly throughout the winter like it is spring time. While it is likely that indoor conditions probably had something to do with these disturbing occurrences, in previous years we have not had the same problem keeping diapausing anise chrysalises indoors. Just today we had two individuals, one male and one female, eclose from what appeared to be diapausing chrysalises right in the dead of winter. What a terrible mistake this seems! Where we live, this time of year has some of the lowest average temperatures and obviously, the shortest photoperiod. 

The male is shown below.

Yes, we have made several other posts already discussing this so this is not really any new news. But while some of the other anise swallowtails that we have seen eclosing from diapausing chrysalises in October and November were sort of ambigous, both in their reason for eclosing and in their appearance, these seem like they really thought it was spring time. For one, the previous individuals came from diapausing chrysalises that went into diapausing in the summer for absolutely no reason other than their genetics (presumably); the two that eclosed today came from diapausing chrysalises of an actual last and fall brood that pupated in October (even at low temperatures, they should not take two months to eclose normally so we assume that they were diapausing at some point). Even more interesting is that the two that emerged today is that they actually look distinctly spring-like. By that, we mean that they have typical spring time anise swallowtail characterstics, certain features that ocurr almost exclusively in the first spring brood eclosing from diapausing chrysalises of the previous year(s). Below we compare the male (left) to a mid-June male from this year. 

A few things are evident that cue us in here. The spring indivuals are typically smaller and much paler in color. While we don't have exact wingspan data, we did notice (in person of course) that the shade of the left on to be particularly pale which is consistent with the photos. Lighting can have an effect on the shade of the yellow but this is the best that we can do. Next is the amount of blue and black on the borders of the wings. Summer males typically have very little blue such as the one in the picture on the right while spring males usually have a lot like the one on the left. Summer individuals (both males and females) tend to have a lot more black on the borders as well compared to spring individuals which is also apparent in the photos. While it is unclear what exactly causes these differences, these little things were quite interesting for us to take note of. 

- Brian