A white-coloured Papilio agenor ♀ from Hainan China

[Leonard187]

I have got a very white female Papilio agenor specimen from Hainan, China. It is very attractive for me because of its beautiful colour. And pic 3 list several white specimens I kept, and I find that the white individuals often distributed in Guangdong, Guangxi, and Hainan as summer generation. however, the spring generation individuals there are often black. I have not seen white ones from other parts of China so far.

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[Chuck]

Spectacular. Are those truly naturally occurring or maybe bred in that region?

[Leonard187]

Spectacular. Are those truly naturally occurring or maybe bred in that region?

Thay are all wild-caught. The left hindwing of the individual in Figure 1 was damaged. Therefore, I made a mirror image of the right one, so it seems odd.
In these resions of China, the white females can be seen naturally during summer (I capture here from a video on website). However, when spring, the females are often dark and a little small.

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Herein, some people incubate the pupae without deliberately selective breeding. Interestingly, a friend selected a white female parent, but the hatching time of the eggs caused the pupae to become over-wintering pupae, resulting in diapause. The offsprigs are all dark (some have white patch on the cells of hindwings), but no white ones. Here Is one photo.

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[adamcotton]

It is interesting that the extreme white forms seem to be restricted to the 'summer' (wet season) generation in nature. They occur naturally in Indochina too.

I selectively bred extreme versions of these over a period of many years, which were almost entirely white, and these were not seasonal, perhaps because in the lowland here in Chiang Mai (330m asl.) there is minimal pupal diapause in the cool season.

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Adam.

[Leonard187]

It is interesting that the extreme white forms seem to be restricted to the 'summer' (wet season) generation in nature. They occur naturally in Indochina too.

I selectively bred extreme versions of these over a period of many years, which were almost entirely white, and these were not seasonal, perhaps because in the lowland here in Chiang Mai (330m asl.) there is minimal pupal diapause in the cool season.

super white agenor.jpg

spotless super white agenor.jpg

Adam.

Thanks for your sharing, and these two individuals are really extremely white. I do not know whether this phenotype is related to the temperature (hot make it white, maybe?). I heared that P.agenor in Japan also has similar pattern, with individuals in the extreme southern region (Iriomote Island) appearing whiter.
BTW, I heared that the ssp. of Iriomote Island was extint, is that true?