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Blue Morpho Butterfly
The Blue Morpho Butterfly (Morpho menelaus) is an
iridescent blue butterfly that lives in rainforests of South and Central
America, including Brazil, Costa Rica, and Venezuela.
Anatomy
The Blue Morpho Butterfly is a species of neotropical butterfly that has brilliant
blue wings (the females are are not as brilliantly
colored as the males and have a brown edge with white spots surrounding the
iridescent blue area). The undersides (visible when the butterfly is resting)
are brown with bronze-colored eyespots.
The Blue Morpho has a wingspan of about 6 inches (15 cm). Adults drink the
juices of rotting fruit using their straw-like proboscis.
The caterpillar of the Blue Morpho is red-brown with bright patches of
lime-green on the back, and it eats the plant Erythroxylum pilchrum
nocturnally (at night).
Classification
Order Lepidoptera (butterflies and moths), Family
Nymphalidae (brush-footed butterflies), Genus Morpho, Species menelaus.