Psyche Butterfly is a white colored butterfly from the Pieridae family. It is a common one in Kerala; can be seen even in the households.
Photo 1: Photo from Cheruvally, Kerala
Photo 2: Feeding on Ceylon slitwort flower (known as Thumba in Malayalam; Thumbai in Tamil). Taken from my home yard.
Photo 3: Exif – f/3.3, ISO 800, 1/60 sec., -0.3 step, Nikon D7100, Micro-Nikkor 105 mm f2.8G. Location: Cheruvally, Kerala. Date – Feb 16, 2016.
The butterfly can be often seen feeding on the flowers of Thumba and other small plants. Thumba (Leucas zeylanica) is small medicinal plant with white flowers. Small plants like this were once very common all over. But now, many people don’t know their values, and remove them; resulting in the decrease of their numbers. So try to preserve these plants if you find it in your households.
Coming back to Psyche, it is small in size and generally stay closer to the ground. It has a black spot on the upper side of each fore-wing. Under side has white color with some grainy appearance. They fly very slowly from plant to plant.
Species: Leptosia nina
