Range: The Red Admiral is a widespread butterfly found in temperate regions of North America, Europe, North Africa and Asia. It's southern North American range extends through Mexico and down into Guatemala. During the summer, the Red Admiral extends its range into northern Canada. It cannot survive the winters in the northern parts of its range but recolonizes every summer. It overwinters as an adult in southern regions and can also hibernate during periods of extreme cold.
Caterpillar hosts: Various species of nettle.
Adult food: Adults prefer tree sap, fermented fruit, bird droppings and other forms of manure. When these are not available they will take nectar from flowers. (The Red Admiral in the top photo is on a piece of plywood that was formerly the bottom to our garden cart which has hauled many a load of manure.)
Sources and More Info:
BugGuide Species Page
Butterflies and Moths of North America
Iowa State University
Wikipedia
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7 comments:
Great photos. Perfect focus plane.
Nice.
Two new posts at 'I C U Nature'
Eryngos and Argiopes.
Green Tree Frogs.
Come visit and tell us what you think,
Troy & Martha
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Beautiful photos, I love this species of butterfly, they are so pretty to photograph and usually easy to approach.
That top shot's fantastic! I remember once in Canada, I went for a hike in "my" woods & was horrified to find dozens of these butterflies dead all in one area. Perhaps the temperature dipped a bit to far for them at some point.
Beautiful shots of this lovely buttrfly Marvin.
Of course the first one is awesome, however the second one is also beautiful. Actually I like to see a butterfly from both upper wing side and lower wing side.
I just love this butterfly. I have done a large painting of it. Great photos.
thx marvin, i've seen some of these, but not in the maritimes...
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