Papilio lowi

Papilio lowii, the great yellow Mormon or Asian swallowtail, is a butterfly of the family Papilionidae. The species was first described by Herbert Druce in 1873. It is found in Borneo, Indonesia, and the Philippines (Palawan, Balabac).^[2]

Great yellow Mormon
Dorsal view of female
Scientific classification
Domain:	Eukaryota
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Arthropoda
Class:	Insecta
Order:	Lepidoptera
Family:	Papilionidae
Genus:	Papilio
Species:	P. lowii
Binomial name
Papilio lowii H. Druce, 1873
Synonyms
Papilio lowi Rothschild, 1895[1] Menelaides memnon lowii Page & Treadaway, 2003[1]

Description

Wingspan: 107–126 mm (4.2–5.0 in) Male and female tailed. Male black, upper surface of the forewing with rather short blue-grey stripes at the distal margin; hindwing with broad, blue-grey, densely scaled band, which extends nearly to the distal margin, is almost uniformly concave towards the base and does not reach the cell. Female in two principal forms; forewing with the exception of the base much lighter, the red basal spot at least indicated, the blackish stripes between the veins weaker than in the memnon-forms, hindwing with large white, distally yellowish central area, which is intersected by the thin black veins: female-f. zephyria form, nov.) the hindwing almost entirely black, without white area: female -f. suffusus Lathy. — Palawan, Balabac and North Borneo. ^[3]

Biology

Larvae feed on citrus plants. Adults nectar on various flowers.

Adults of P. lowi, much like other Mormons, mimic the inedible red-bodied swallowtails.

Taxonomy

lowi has been considered a subspecies of Papilio memnon.

It is named after British colonial administrator and naturalist Hugh Low.^{[4] [5]}