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Volume 26, Number 4
235
CONFIRMATION OF A DISPUTED FOODPLANT OF PAPILIO GLAUCUS (PAPILIONIDAE)
J. Mark Scriber
Department of Entomology, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York 14850
Although reported as a polyphagous species, feeding on more than 13 families, 21 genera, and 34 species of plants, Papilio glaucus L. does appear to have different foodplant preferences in different regions over its range (Brower, 1958; Remington, 1968).
Because foodplant records in the literature are frequently suspect (Brower, 1958; Shields, Emmel, & Breedlove, 1970), I feel it important to verify a single, very early observation by Sir John Abbot, who recorded P. glaucus feeding on hop tree, Ptelea trifoliata (Rutaceae). This observation was made in Georgia and was reported in his manuscripts (Abbot, 1792-1804), which have been cited by Boisduval & LeConte (1833), DTJrban (1857) and Scudder (1889). I have been unable to find any other recorded observations of P. glaucus on Ptelea.
My observation was made on 5 July 1971, in the Cornell Plantations near Ithaca, New York. A very early second instar larva was found resting on a leaflet approximately six feet off the ground. This larva was taken back to the laboratory and reared for positive identification through all of its stadia on leaves from this plant. This wafer ash (hop tree) is in the open and is maintained as part of the Plantation.
Within the rest of the P. glaucus group, Kendall (1957, 1964) reported finding Papilio multicaudatus Kirby larvae on Ptelea trifoliata in Texas, confirming Behr's (1884) observation in California. Comstock (1927) reported Ptelea baldwinii as a foodplant for Papilio rutulus Boisduval in California. This hop tree has been incorrectly interpreted as 'hop' (Humulus) since that time (see Brower, 1958), and perhaps such confusion is responsible also for the rather unlikely records of P. glaucus feeding on Humulus lupulus (e.g. Scudder, 1889; Teitz, 1952). Possibly the 'ash,' Fraxinus trifoliata, referred to by Couper (1874) as a foodplant of P. glaucus, was also in reality the wafer ash, Ptelea trifoliata.
I feel that my observation of P. glaucus on Rutaceae is interesting from the standpoint of the 'synergistic co-evolution' of the Papilionidae and their foodplants (Slansky, in press). Unlike related smooth, green, eye-spotted larvae in Asia (Papilio bianor Cram, group) which feed on Rutaceae (Jordan, 1908), the P. glaucus group and the Papilio troilus L. group are both believed to have arisen in the New World and to have
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Journal of the Lepidopterists' Society
fed originally on Lauraceae and Magnoliaceae before expanding their foodplant diets (Forbes, 1932, 1958; Munroe, 1960).
Having both the essential oils of the Umbelliferae and the alkaloids of the Aristolochiaceae and Magnoliales (including Magnoliaceae, Lauraceae, and Annonaceae), the Rutaceae seem to have played a key role in much of the co-evolution of the Papilionidae and their foodplants (Dethier, 1941; Ehrlich & Raven, 1965). Whether or not this P. gZawcas-Rutaceae interaction is some relic from the phylogenetic past of P. glaucus, or a secondary consequence of its polyphagous habit, is unknown.
Literature Cited
Abbot, J. 1792-1804. Drawings of the Insects of Georgia. 17 vols. Library of
the British Museum. Also Boston Society of Natural History: Oemler and Gray
Collections of Harvard University Library. Behr, H. H. 1884. Biological synopses of California Lepidoptera. Bull. Calif. Acad.
Sci. 1: 63-65. Boisduval, J. A. & M. J. LeConte. 1833. Histoire generale et iconographie des
Lepidopteres des Chenilles de l'Amerique septentrionale. Librarie Encyclopedique
de Boret. Paris. 228 p. Brower, L. P. 1958. Larval foodplant specificity in butterflies of the P. glaucus
group. Lepid. News 12: 103-114. Comstock, J. A. 1927. Butterflies of California. Comstock, Los Angeles. 334 p. Couper, W. 1874. A dissertation on northern btrtterflies. Can. Entomol. 6: 91-96. Dethier, V. G. 1941. Chemical factors determining the choice of foodplants by
Papilio larvae. Amer. Nat. 75: 61—73. D'Urban, W. S. M. 1857. On the order Lepidoptera, with the description of two
species of Canadian butterflies. Can. Nat. & Geol. 2: 223—236. Ehrlich, P. B. & P. H. Baven. 1965. Butterflies and plants: a study in co-evolution.
Evolution 18: 586-608. Forbes, W. T. M. 1932. How old are the Lepidoptera? Amer. Nat. 98: 452-460.
----------. 1958. Caterpillars as botanists. Proc. 10th Int. Cong. Entomol. 1: 313-317.
Jordan, K. 1908. The Indo-Australian Bhopalocera, in A. Seitz, Macrolepidoptera
of the World. Vol. 9. Stuttgart. Kendall, B. O. 1957. New foodplants in Texas for Papilio multicaudatus. Lepid.
News 11: 224. ----------. 1964. Larval foodplants of twenty-six species of Rhopalocera (Papilionidae)
from Texas. J. Lepid. Soc. 18: 129-157. Munroe, E. 1960. The generic classification of the Papilionidae. Can. Entomol.,
Suppl. 17. 51 p. Bemington, C. L. 1968. Suture zones of hybrid interaction between recently
joined biotas, in T. Dobzhansky, ed., Evolutionary Biology 2: 321-428. Scudder, S. H. 1889. The Butterflies of the Eastern U. S. and Canada. 3 vols.
Publ. by the author. Cambridge, Mass. Shields, O., J. M. Emmel & D. E. Breedlove. 1970. Butterfly larval foodplant
records and a procedure for reporting foodplants. J. Bes. Lepid. 8: 20-36. Slansky, F. 1973. Latitudinal gradients in species diversity of the New World
swallowtail butterflies (Papilionidae). J. Bes. Lepid. (in press). Tietz, H. M. 1952. The Lepidoptera of Pennsylvania, a Manual. Pennsylvania
State College, Pa. 194 p.