Incredible Insects! #6 Butterfly

Hi again everyone and welcome back to another look at another incredible insect! We have another butterfly to show you today, the Canadian Tiger Swallowtail. This is a very common butterfly in our area and one of our larger butterflies.

It is very similar to the Eastern Tiger Swallowtail which lives further south than we do. These beautiful butterflies can be found from about the third week of May to the middle of July. They have a wingspan of 3 to 4 inches (7.5 to 10cm). They overwinter as a chrysalis and emerge around the third or fourth week of May, depending on the weather.

Canadian Tiger Swallowtail on lilac flowers.

The males come out first, often in quite large numbers and will spend much time on wet sand or wet mud where they pick up moisture. As butterflies some of their main choices for flowers to feed on are lilacs, Labrador tea, cherry and apple blossoms and wood lilies.

They have one brood each summer and the caterpillars feed on quaking aspen, birch and willows, plus others. Caterpillars feed at night and are large, green and about 3 inches (7.5cm) in length. On our trip out to some lakes last Thursday we encountered a lot of these butterflies, mainly enjoying themselves on lilacs, apple blossoms and dandelions.

And here we have a side view.

They are always such a wonderful butterfly to see. But it’s not always that easy to get photos of them as they like to fly high and they don’t always like to sit for very long. Except in the early part of the season when they just emerge as butterflies and they are looking for food sources. Well, have a great day everyone and God bless!

Steve and Muffin.

©2025 Steve McLeod.