Abstract
I HAVE spent a good many hours lately in a Devonshire garden in which there was a border of massed mauve asters which was a great attraction to butterflies. The border measured 27 ft. by 2½ ft. only, but it was no unusual thing to see on it 150 butterflies—Peacocks, Red Admirals, Tortoiseshell, Clouded Yellows—a very wonderful sight. The object of my letter is to describe to your readers two “scraps” which I witnessed between tortoiseshell butterflies and wasps, in each of which the butterfly was victorious. The method adopted was the same in each case. The butterfly sprang on to the back of the wasp, the head of each being towards the tail of the other, and a furious rough-and-tumble took place some 6 ft. from the ground. The wasp was unable to use its sting, as the butterfly was on its back, and at the end of perhaps five seconds the butterfly, which had been buffeting the wasp with its wings, dropped to within a foot of the grass, relaxed the hold which it had exerted, and allowed its enemy to drop breathless and beaten on to the lawn.
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CLARKE, A. Butterfly v. Wasp. Nature 100, 85 (1917). https://doi.org/10.1038/100085b0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/100085b0
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