Callosamia promethea (Drury, 1773) - femelă

Unknown artist

At the needle there is a label of determination Species spread in the south-east of the United States, characterized by the existence of a pronounced sex dimorphism: males, blackish in color, imitate a toxic diurnal species, Battus philenor (Linnaeus, 1771). The noticeable differences are that in the males of Callosamia promethea (Drury, 1773) there are missing the tail of the hind wings, the front wings are more rounded at the tip, the edge of the wings has a cream-colored drawing and missing some graphic elements, bright blue, present on the dorsal face of the wings at Battus philenor (Linnaeus, 1771). However, the differences listed above proved to be difficult for potential predators to notice, the effectiveness of this case of Batesian mimetism being tested and proved experimentally (Waldbauer, 1996). Dr. Valeriu Albu (n. in Brasov, in 1950) is a Romanian lepidopterologist established in the United States (emigrated with his family in 1983). As a physician, he worked in several hospitals in Ohio, West Virginia and California. After collecting an important entomological material in a few areas of southern Romania in his youth, he continued to collect numerous specimens from the regions he had the opportunity to visit. From 2002 he settled in Fresno (California) being interested in the study of primitive lepidoptera and mining in the Piedmont area of the Sierra Nevada Mountains. Part of his collection is currently at the National Museum of Natural History “Grigore Antipa” from Bucharest.