Papilio polymnestor parinda

[daveuk]

Ex pupae pair from Sri Lanka.

[Trehopr1]

Absolutely stunning pair !

[58chevy]

Wow!

[livingplanet3]

This beautiful species seems to only rarely be available in the US. I've not been able to obtain a specimen.

[daveuk]

This beautiful species seems to only rarely be available in the US. I've not been able to obtain a specimen.

These were from pupae sold by the Stratford on Avon butterfly farm in England in 2007. They seemed to be available for a very short time. Here are another pair from the same source. The male is more heavily marked & the female has more straw colouring

[adamcotton]

This beautiful species seems to only rarely be available in the US. I've not been able to obtain a specimen.

I think the Lacey Act stops this species from being sold in the USA, as it is protected in both India (ssp. polymnestor) and Sri Lanka.

Adam.

[livingplanet3]

This beautiful species seems to only rarely be available in the US. I've not been able to obtain a specimen.

I think the Lacey Act stops this species from being sold in the USA, as it is protected in both India (ssp. polymnestor) and Sri Lanka.

Adam.

Thanks for the clarification. Knowing that India and Sri Lanka have protections on butterflies, I had a feeling that there might be some restriction preventing the import of polymnestor to the US, hence its unavailability here.

[livingplanet3]

Atrophaneura horishana, a Taiwan endemic, is another Asian swallowtail that I only quite rarely see available in the US anymore -



What few specimens I've seen offered in the past 30 years or so were all apparently old stock. I remember frequently seeing horishana on entomological dealers' stock lists back in the late 1970s through 1980s, however. I seem to recall a colleague of mine from Taiwan once mentioning that just before 1990, Taiwan enacted wildlife protection laws that covered endemic butterflies, so I assume that's why horishana and at least several other Taiwan species became largely unavailable at that point, including Agehana maraho -

[daveuk]

Atrophaneura horishana, a Taiwan endemic, is another Asian swallowtail that I only quite rarely see available in the US anymore -



What few specimens I've seen offered in the past 30 years or so were all apparently old stock. I remember frequently seeing horishana on entomological dealers' stock lists back in the late 1970s through 1980s, however. I seem to recall a colleague of mine from Taiwan once mentioning that just before 1990, Taiwan enacted wildlife protection laws that covered endemic butterflies, so I assume that's why horishana and at least several other Taiwan species became largely unavailable at that point, including Agehana maraho -

Think you are right. Although Taiwan or Formosa as it once was known exported huge numbers of specimens in the 70s & 80s all butterflies from that country are now protected from export.
I did get two pairs of A horishanus from a British dealer in the mid 80s
Was also very lucky to find a male A maraho in an old collection a few years back. This one has always been difficult to get hold of in my experience