Parnassians

Rocky Mountain parnassian

Parnassian butterflies, aka Snow Apollos. Named for Mount Parnassus in Greece, a massif large enough to host a ski resort today, and former home to nymphs, Apollo, and the Dionysian mysteries.

Parnassians are adapted to life at elevation. Their white wings can act as solar reflectors for their dark bodies, which absorb the heat. They have been documented flying in snowstorms. They overwinter as eggs, and unlike most butterflies, make silk to attach themselves to something during metamorphosis.

During mating, males produce a sphragis, or “waxy genital plug,” to prevent the female from mating again. That’s what you see in the somewhat disturbing scene below. So it’s worth saying that the sphragis is not exclusively a ball and chain. It also contains a gift of nutrients: mostly salts that the male filters from water puddles.

Clodius parnassian

Clodius parnassian

Parnassians are also unusual in that the dark-looking areas of their wings are in fact translucent, because they lack the scales that ordinarily give pigmentation.

In my area, parnassian larvae feed on lanceleaf stonecrop, a succulent plant that inhabits many dry niches from montane to alpine. They can use secondary compounds from the plant to make themselves unpalatable to predators.

It’s a challenge for me to get any pictures of butterflies using my point-and-shoot. I thank the Parnassians for tolerating me.

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