Butterfly

A butterfly is a flying insect with large, often colourful wings. Butterflies taste with their feet, which carry taste sensors. When a butterfly lands on a leaf it is also tasting it, so that every landing doubles as a review.^[1] Female butterflies use this to check whether a plant is a good place to lay their eggs, a process gardeners describe as stamping on the vegetables.

Drinking

Butterflies drink through a long tube called a proboscis, which stays rolled up like a garden hose when not in use. As well as nectar, some butterflies drink from puddles to get salt and minerals. In the Amazon, some have been photographed drinking the tears of turtles.^[2] The turtles appear to put up with this, and are not thought to be crying about it.

The butterfly's habit of gathering at the edges of puddles is known as “puddling”, a word chosen by scientists who had clearly had a long day.

Wings

Butterfly wings are covered in thousands of tiny scales. Some colours come from pigments, but others, especially many blues, come from the structure of the scales bending light, like a soap bubble. These butterflies are not, strictly speaking, blue. They are just very good at looking it.

See also

• Puddle – a popular drinking spot
• Blue – a colour some butterflies only pretend to be
• Bubble – which colours itself the same way
• Hummingbird – a butterfly that is a bird

References

1. Flutter, F. (2002). Footnotes: Tasting With Feet. Meadow Press.
2. Tortoise, T. (2014). “Turtles Who Are Not Sad”. Amazon Notes 2: 2.
3. Scale, S. (1999). Blue, Allegedly. Prism Books.