Butterflies Facts
Butterflies can only feed or fly when their bodies are warmed to at least 30° C, and they have to gain this from the sunshine using their wings. Butterflies are often seen basking with their wings open wide, as they gain heat. They adjust the area exposed to the sun by overlapping their wings or angling them towards the sunshine. The veins located in the wings then carry the heat to the body. Colour helps the butterfly with their temperature control. Dark colours absorb more heat, than light colours. Some butterflies such as the Blues have a shiny underside to their wing, which can help them reflect heat.
Here I just want to post about butterfly facts. Some about buttefly facts are:
a. The word butterfly was first used to describe a butter coloured insect- the brimstone butterfly. ‘Butterfly’ eventually came to include all the species and the brimstone acquired its present name which relates to the colour of sulphur.
b. Butterfly wings are not solely for flight; they also act as miniature solar panels.
c. The word butterfly came from the English word Buttorfleoge. Perhaps because, in mediaeval times, butterflies could be seen hovering around butterchurns or that their excrement is yellowish in colour.
d. A caterpillar grows to about 27,000 times the size it was when it first emerged from its egg. So if a human baby weighed 9 pounds (4kg)at birth and grew at the same rate as a caterpillar, it would weigh 243,000 pounds (110,000kg) when fully grown!
e. The Monarch's Mexican wintering site was only discovered in 1975.
f. In the pupa stage the caterpillar’s body is turned to a gel-like liquid and the cells are broken down and reorganized.
g. Monarchs have been known to migrate over 3000km. In fact a Monarch tagged at Presqu'ile, here in southern Ontario, was recovered in Mexico and is on record as being the longest insect migration.
