Anne Elliott's photos with the keyword: Colobura dirce

This is one of my favourite tropical butterflies - I love the pattern on the underside of the wings. Taken on 8 September 2011 in the ENMAX Conservatory at the Calgary Zoo. This one had landed on a rather dirty window. This species, known as the Mosaic or Zebra Mosaic, (Colobura dirce) is a butterfly of the family Nymphalidae. It is found in Central America and northern South America. "The butterflies habitually sit on the tree trunks in a head downwards posture, at a height of about 2 metres, to imbibe sap and moisture from crevices in the bark. If approached they sometimes try to evade the intruder by running around to the opposite side of the tree, and if followed will run back to their original position - quite literally forcing the observer to run around in circles after them. They are extremely reluctant to take flight when feeding, and if they are forced to do so they quickly return to resume feeding." www.learnaboutbutterflies.com/Amazon%20-%20Colobura%20dir...

This is one of my favourite tropical butterflies - I love the pattern on the underside of the wings. Taken on 30 September 2011 in the ENMAX Conservatory at the Calgary Zoo.

The Mosaic tropical butterfly is one of my favourites - love the black and white abstract design on the underwings. Taken in the ENMAX Conservatory at the Calgary Zoo on 22nd April 2010.

Another beautiful tropical butterfly seen in the ENMAX Conservatory at the Calgary Zoo - one of my favourites, with its abstract design. I just haven't had time to be on Flick and I am also posting very late this evening! My alarm (actually two alarm clocks, LOL) started to blare at 4:30 a.m. today, after managing to get about an hour's sleep) ready to set out on a long day of'botanizing. We were extremely fortunate to get the chance to see the beautiful rolling hills of virgin prairie belonging to Raymond Nadeau, way down south and not all that far north of Waterton National Park on the US/Canada border. We drove westwards once we were almost there, going west past the Head-Smashed-in Buffalo Jump. Gorgeous scenery and a lovely selection of wild prairie plants. Many thanks to Jim Coutts, who very generously led this trip and to Raymond and his wife for the very welcome and much enjoyed cups of tea that they kindly made for us at the end of the outing! And how we enjoyed tasting some of their frozen Huckleberries, too. I don't remember ever having these before, but they are sweet and delicious. It took about two and a half hours to get there and the same back. Now I will be staying up all night, as I have to leave the house about 2:45 a.m. (yes A.M.!!!) to go on an annual walk in Weaselhead, called Dawn Chorus, where we get to see and especially hear the various species of bird awaken in the morning. I am already struggling to stay awake, so would probably sleep through my alarm if I tried to get an hour or two of sleep, so I usually stay up. I have a bird walk at 9:00 a.m. tomorrow, too, and the Dawn Chorus will probably end somewhere around 7:00 or 7:15 a.m. after maybe three plus hours of walking. Will have to kill the time in between and then see if I can still stay awake. The following morning (Sunday), I need to be up around 5:15 a.m. ready for a full day of botanizing east of the city, in the Badlands. A healthy way to live in some ways, but definitely not as far as sleep (or rather, lack of it) is concerned, LOL! Now I need to download all of today's photos to my computer and get my (camera) batteries recharged, etc.

I was just magnetized by this amazingly beautiful black and white butterfly at the Calgary Zoo yesterday afternoon. It's only a small butterfly, but I just love the smart abstract pattern. I've been trying to find an ID for this on Google, but unlucky so far : ) I think this is a Dirce Beauty Colobura (Colobura dirce), which is a butterfly of the Nymphalidae family. It is found in Central America and the Northern parts of South America. The length of the fore-wings is about 33 mm.