The Difference between Butterflies and Moths

If somebody asked what are the differences between a butterfly and a moth you'd probably say that there is mainly no difference. But there you would be wrong:

Difference one:
Butterflies have knobbed antennae while the moth's are ranged from straight filaments to feathery or branched.

Difference two:
Butterflies have smoothed bodies. Moths have plump and fuzzy bodies.

Difference three:
Most butterflies fly during the day light, while moths tend to fly during the night.

Difference four:
Most butterflies rest with their wings upright; moths rest with their wings spread out.

Difference five:
If you want to tell the difference between a moth and a butterfly, butterflies are usually brightly colored or with some colors and moths are usually very grayish and whitish.

Life Cycle of the Butterfly

The life cycle of a butterfly all begins when a female butterfly and a male mate. They stay in the position shown below for about two hours and after that, the male flies away and at this point, the female is ready to go look for a spot where to lie her eggs.

The male & female butterfly remain together for about two hours.

All kinds of butterflies will die after they lay their eggs. Different kinds of butterflies have different ways of laying their eggs but the ways are all very similar. For example, the female Peacock Butterfly, a month after mating, (about in May) looks and finds a bunch of stinging nettles, (which will sting you when you try to touch the nettle of the leaf) and circles around and around and stops at one of the upper leaves.

Life Cycle of the Butterfly (continued)

Most of you probably wonder why butterflies have antennae, and here's your chance to figure it out. To smell. It probably sounds weird, but a butterfly uses them to smell the right leaf to chose to lay her eggs on. The right leaf for a butterfly to feed on, is a cabbage leaf. When the female finds a leaf, she lays her eggs underneath it. After all this, it's the stage where the female butterfly dies.

After about a week, you can see the small caterpillars through the transparent, thin egg. They are a color between dark green and gray. These eggs are only one millimeter long, so you wouldn't be able to see one easily without a magnifying glass. In a short period larvae come out from the top of the pile. These larvae are often called caterpillars.

Caterpillars are very fast eaters and they grow very fast.

As soon as the caterpillars come out they start chewing on the nettle of the leaf. When they eat the leaves they stay together in groups and within 24 hours they have eaten their first whole leaf. When the nettle is finished they move on to nearby leaves. Caterpillars are very fast eaters and they grow very fast. This is why they soon begin to molt (which can also be called skin sheddings). After molting about four times they are then ready to become a pupa. This means it's the last step before they become full-grown butterflies. Now the groups split up, they start to live on their own.

Each full-grown caterpillar finds its own spot where it's safe and can hang and calmly pupate. When it has found a nice spot, the caterpillar spins a small cushion of silk from thread which comes out of a place under its mouth. Then it turns around and pushes its back feet into the silk and holds on tightly. Now it lets go with the rest of the feet and hangs upside down. It hangs in this position for 1 or 2 days.

Underneath its skin it's already making a pupa. After it does many movements and gets tired finally the skin breaks open at the back of its head and the pupa begins to come out. The pupa manages to cover itself with the silk cushion and gets rid of the old caterpillar skin. Soon the pupa skin hardens and inside starts taking the shape of a butterfly.

Finally after about 2 weeks, a beautiful butterfly hatches.