Tag Archives: tulip tree

HOW TO TELL THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN A MALE AND FEMALE TIGER SWALLOWTAIL

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Tigers on the prowl in our garden!

It’s very easy to see the difference between a male and female Tiger Swallowtail.

The female Tiger Swallowtail’s tail end of her lower wings are more vividly colored, with strongly pronounced cells of orange and a greater degree of iridescent blue.

Female Tiger Swallowtail drinking nectar from Phlox

Male Tiger Swallowtail. Note the very dark border along the tail end of the male TS lower wings, with very little blue iridescent scales

The Eastern Tiger Swallowtail utilizes a large variety of host plants, mostly trees, such as wild black cherry, tulip tree, sweet bay (magnolia), cottonwood, ash, birch, and willow.

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Gloucester HarborWalk Tulip Tree Image to Travel Around the World

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Recently my friend Joey (the creator of Good Morning Gloucester, the blog for which I am a daily contributor) was contacted by The Field Museum in Chicago about a GMG post from May 2012. They were interested in acquiring an image of mine from a post about our beautiful HarborWalk Tulip Trees, planted at St. Peter’s Square.

Tulip Tree Gloucester HarborWalk ©Kim Smith 2012 copyTulip Tree at the Gloucester HarborWalk Butterfly Garden

The Field Museum is currently developing an engaging new scientific exhibition on the topic of Biomechanics that will debut in the spring of 2014.  Led by the curatorial efforts of Field Museum Curator of Zoology, Dr. Mark Westneat, the exhibition will explore the science of looking at living things as machines built by nature and evolution.  One of the topics presented includes wind and how the leaves of a tree change in the wind.

I selected Tulip Trees for the gardens not only because they have a lovely ornamental bi-color effect when the leaves catch the wind, but primarily because they have a storied connection to Gloucester history. Liriodendron tulipifera was one of the primary woods used for tall ship’s masts, and because much of the wood from which the CB Fisk organs are built is Tulip Poplar (thank you to Greg Bover for the information about the Fisk connection to tulip poplar!). Tulip Trees are also a caterpillar food plant for the Eastern Tiger Swallowtail butterfly!

See post about Tulip Trees ~ Welcome Tulip Trees!