Does anybody know any interesting facts about Butterflies? Or a good website with a lot of information about them? I want to know everything there is to know about them. Anything would be a lot of help. Thanks! =)

Here’s a sampling of what I found using our (Quoteland’s) search feature:
http://forum.quoteland.com/eve/forums?a=tpc&s=586192041&f=487195441&m=5041955902&r=9681955902#9681955902

Two caterpillars are conversing and a beautiful butterfly floats by.
One caterpillar turns and says to the other,
"You'll never get me up on one of those butterfly things."
http://www.squarewheels.com/content/teaching.html
"One cannot become a butterfly by remaining a caterpillar."

Once upon a time, I, Chuang Chou, dreamt I was a butterfly, fluttering hither and thither, to all intents and purposes a butterfly. I was conscious only of my happiness as a butterfly, unaware that I was Chou. Soon I awaked, and there I was, veritably myself again. Now I do not know whether I was then a man dreaming I was a butterfly, or whether I am now a butterfly, dreaming I am a man. Between a man and a butterfly there is necessarily a distinction. The transition is called the transformation of material things.
~Chuang Tzu (c. 4th century BC), Chinese Philosopher, On Leveling All Things

BUTTERFLY'S DREAM
Otagaki Rengetsu (1791-1875)
Fluttering about sleepily
in a field of
dew-kissed flowers--
could it be the little butterfly
of Chuang-t'zu's dream?
http://www.womensearlyart.net/rags/b/butterflydream.html

Petals on petals
Wings on wings
Beauty on beauty
Nature sings

Gloss on gloss
Glow on glow
Grace on grace
Spectacular show

Flag on flag
Flicker on flicker
Flame on flame
Nectar sipper

Delicate on delicate
Shimmer on shimmer
Symmetry on symmetry
Pollen skimmer

Brilliance on brilliance
Bright on bright
Flower on flower
Taking flight

Guess who.
Answer: Butterfly
The poem Flower on Flower depicts a butterfly resting on a flower and compares the two to each other. What are the 'petals' of the butterfly? What are the 'wings' of the flower? How else are the two alike and what else does the poem compare them to? How does the poem make it clear that the butterfly is the main subject? How are the butterfly and the flower linked biologically? (Hint: food and pollination.) The poem was inspired by a traditional Quichua proverb that states: I'm a flying flower on a flower. Who am I?
http://www.ccph.com/amazonproject/classroompackage/aama/aama1photo.html

A subject of my heart...


Butterflies - Common Facts.

• Butterflies range in size from a tiny 1/8 inch to a huge almost 12 inches.
• Butterflies cannot fly if their body temperature is less than 86 degrees.
• Butterflies and insects have their skeletons on the outside of their bodies, called the exoskeleton. This protects the insect and keeps water inside their bodies so they don’t dry out.
• Many butterflies can taste with their feet to find out whether the leaf they sit on is good to lay eggs on to be their caterpillars' food or not.
• Butterflies that fly in the night and sit with their wings open are NOT butterflies. They are Moths.
• There are about 28,000 known butterfly species throughout the world.
• A caterpillar grows to about 27,000 times the size it was when it first emerged from its egg. If a human baby weighed 9 pounds at birth and grew at the same rate as a caterpillar, it would weigh 243,000 pounds when fully grown.
• Caterpillars have over 1,000 muscles which they use to move from place to place and they can move at a very quick pace. For if you find a caterpillar and place him in a designated place, before you know it , he will have crawled out of sight!
• Butterflies find a mate by flying in spiraling circles around each other.

... to be contd.

*********************************************************************

The caterpillar does all the work but the butterfly gets all the publicity.
-- Attributed to George Carlin

*********************************************************************

-

much love, light and laughter,
ananya.

*~Come play with my children feel the peace and Scatter some joy.~*
~*Blowing out someone else's candle doesn't make your's burn any brighter.*~
We can't all be stars, but we can all twinkle.

Scientific Classification of Butterflies:

Butterflies and moth belong to the order Lepidoptera. Lepidos is Greek for "scales" and ptera means "wing". These scaled wings are different from the wings of any other insects. Lepidoptera is a very large group; there are more types of butterflies and moths than there are of any other type of insects except beetles. It is estimated that there are about 120,000 different species of butterflies and moths.

Order Lepidoptera has three sub-orders, viz. Jugatae (primitive butterflies), Frenatae(most moths) and Rhopalocera (butterflies and skippers).

Lepidoptera, suborder Rhopalocera: consists of two superfamilies, viz. Superfamily Hesperioidea which is a family(Hesperiidae) of skippers that are a relatively small, fast-flying species about 3000 in no. worldwide and Superfamily Papilionaoidea, which are butterflies.

***

Superfamily Papilionoidae: contains 7 different families which are listed as follows -

• Family Papilionidae, Swallowtail Butterflies - about 600 species worldwide, most of them have prominant tails.
• Family Pieridae, Yellow-White Butterflies - over 1000 species worldwide.
• Family Lycaenidae, Gossammer Winged Butterflies like Blues, Hairstreaks and Coppers - over 5000 species worldwide, the colours and patterns of the sexes frequently differ in case of these butterflies.
• Family Riodinidae, Metal mark Butterflies - about 1000 species worldwide.
• Family Helioconiidae , Tropical Butterflies associated with passion vines for eg. Zebra Longwing.
• Family Libytheidae, Snout buterflies.
• Family Nymphalidae, Brush footed Butterflies, about 5000 species worldwide.

***

Will come back for detailed names later. In short, ...to be contd.

**************************************************************************

The butterfly’s attractiveness derives not only from colors and symmetry: deeper motives contribute to it. We would not think them so beautiful if they did not fly, or if they flew straight and briskly like bees, or if they stung, or above all if they did not enact the perturbing mystery of metamorphosis: the latter assumes in our eyes the value of a badly decoded message, a symbol, a sign.
-- Primo Levi

**************************************************************************

-

much love, light and laughter,
ananya

*~Come play with my children feel the peace and Scatter some joy.~*
~*Blowing out someone else's candle doesn't make your's burn any brighter.*~
We can't all be stars, but we can all twinkle.

They say that once the wings are touched they never fly again.