PSYCHE 
Vol. 80 March-June 1973 No. 1-2 
NOTES ON THE LIFE CYCLE AND 
NATURAL HISTORY OF 
PA RIDES ARCAS MYLOTES (PAPILIONIDAE) IN 
COSTA RICAN PREMONTANE WET FOREST* 
By Allen M. Young 
Department of Biology, Lawrence University 
Appleton, Wisconsin 5491 1 
The “ Aristolochia- feeding” swallowtails of the New World tropics 
comprise a well-known group of butterflies famous for their roles in 
mimicry complexes (Brower and Brower, 1964). Although the 
adult stages of many congeneric species of notable genera such as 
Battus and Parides have been known for some time (Godman and 
Salvin, 1879-1901; Seitz, 1924), there is considerably less informa- 
tion concerning the immature stages of these butterflies. This is 
particularly the case for the Central American species of Parides , one 
of the three genera ( Battus , Parides , and the Old World Troides) 
of the Troidini, the tribe of pharmacophagous swallowtails (Ehrlich 
and Raven, 1965). While the Troidini are most abundant in the 
Old World tropics, it is apparent that New World genera in this 
tribe, such as Battus and Parides , have undergone extensive speciation 
in Central and South America. And with the exception of a few 
studies such as the recent study of Battus polydamus in Costa Rica 
(Young, 1971a) and another on the related Ornithoptera alexandrae 
on New Guinea (Straatman, 1971), the life cycles, behavior, and 
food plants of many species remain obscure. It is believed that the 
primarily neotropical distribution of the Aristolochiaceae (Pfeifer, 
1966) is a major factor in accounting for the extensive adaptive 
radiation of Parides and Battus on these plants ( Brower and Brower, 
1964; Ehrlich and Raven, 1965). 
It is the close and perhaps coevolutionary association of genera 
such as Parides with Aristolochia (in the Aristolochiaceae) and the 
co-occurrence of several sympatric congeneric species in lowland 
* Manuscript received by the editor March 26, 1973 
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