1. Tiger Swallowtails By Safiya Topiwala

2. Physical Description Their wingspan can be up to 4 to 8 inches. The males are yellow with black tiger stripes. A female’s coloring can be anything from completely black to that of a male’s coloring. If they live in Georgia their coloring has a little hint of orange. A large black border surrounds the edge of the wings.

3. Habitat Tiger swallowtails are found from Alaska and that side of Canada all the way down to the southern states, including east of the Rocky Mountains. They live in nearly every area where deciduous (falling off) forests are present, including towns and cities. They are most numerous along streams and rivers and in wooded swamps, they also live in woodlands and gardens.

4. Food Habits Tiger swallowtail caterpillars’ diets consist of the leaves of various woody plants. These include poplars, mountain ash, birch, cherry, tulip tree, ash, basswood, apple, maple, willow, magnolia, and occasionally sassafras.

5. Behavior As with most butterflies, Eastern tiger swallowtails tend to be solitary. Tiger swallowtails, both male and females, are known to be high fliers. Groups of fifty of the butterflies have been seen in Maryland flying 50 meters high, around the tops of tulip trees.

6. Reproduction Tiger swallowtails reach maturity in the late spring. Many generations are produced each year and the last mature butterflies remain or live into mid-autumn. The females only lay one shiny green egg on host plants one at a time. In the spring the brood is small compared to the much larger summer brood.

7. Additional Facts Tiger swallowtails and all of the other swallowtail subspecies are not endangered, yet. As you go more southern into the tiger swallowtail habitat, the female’s wing coloring starts to get darker and the darker color gets more common.

8. Additional Facts (cont.) The Eastern Tiger Swallowtail is the state butterfly of Alabama, Delaware, Georgia, and South Carolina, and is the state insect of Virginia.

9. Testing Time 1.Do tiger swallowtails live in cities? 2.How exactly does a tiger swallowtail’s egg look like? 3.What state’s state insect is the tiger swallowtail? 4.Tell the difference between the male and female tiger swallowtail.

10. Testing Time (cont.) Bonus Round/5. What three states have the tiger swallowtail as their state butterfly? A.Alabama, Delaware, and Georgia B.Virginia, New Jersey, and Delaware C.Maine, Vermont, and New Hampshire

11. I Hope You Learned A Lot About Tiger Swallowtails z