Mimoides pausanias

Pausanias swallowtail
Mounted specimen on display at Museo di Scienze Naturali Enrico Caffi, Bergamo
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Arthropoda
Class:	Insecta
Order:	Lepidoptera
Family:	Papilionidae
Tribe:	Leptocircini
Genus:	Mimoides
Species:	M. pausanias
Binomial name
Mimoides pausanias (Hewitson, 1852)
Synonyms
Papilio pausanias Hewitson, 1852 Papilio pausanias f. eburneomaculatus Rousseau-Decelle, 1933 Papilio pausanias f. celulata Rosa, 1934 Papilio cleombrotus Strecker, 1885 Papilio hermolaus Guenée, 1872 Papilio pausanias prasinus Rothschild & Jordan, 1906 Papilio pausanias tabaguita Kaye, 1925 Eurytides pausanias[1]

Mimoides pausanias, the Pausanias swallowtail or bluish mimic-swallowtail, is a species of butterfly in the family Papilionidae.

Description

Mimoides pausanias is a large butterfly with iridescent brown color on the upper surface of the wings. The basal portion of the wings is metallic blue, in the centre of the forewing there is a large white or yellow patch, while the apex of the forewings is pale brown. Also the under surface of the wings is iridescent brown with a yellow patch and a submarginal line of bright red markings on the hindwings.

Distribution

This species can be found in the Neotropical ecozone, in northern South America, Costa Rica, Trinidad and Tobago, Colombia, Venezuela, Bolivia, Suriname, Brazil, and Peru.

Subspecies

• Mimoides pausanias pausanias (eastern Colombia to Bolivia, Peru, Surinam and Brazil: Amazonas and Pará)
• Mimoides pausanias cleombrotus (Strecker, 1885) (central Colombia)
• Mimoides pausanias hermolaus (Guenée, 1872) (Venezuela)
• Mimoides pausanias prasinus (Rothschild & Jordan, 1906) (Costa Rica)
• Mimoides pausanias tabaguita (Kaye, 1925) (Trinidad)

Gallery

• 
  Plate 6 accompanying Hewitson's description in the Transactions of the Entomological Society of London for 1852. Mimoides pausanias is figure 2
• 
  Illustration from The Macrolepidoptera of the World Vol. 5

References

• Collins, N. Mark; Morris, Michael G. (1985). Threatened Swallowtail Butterflies of the World: The IUCN Red Data Book. Gland & Cambridge: IUCN. ISBN 978-2-88032-603-6. 
• Lewis, H.L. (1974). Butterflies of the World ISBN 0-245-52097-X Page 23, figure 23

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Mimoides pausanias.

Wikispecies has information related to: Mimoides pausanias

• Savela, Markku. "Mimoides pausanias". funet.fi. Retrieved 6 November 2010. 
• Catalogue of Life