EASY GARDEN BUTTERFLIES
Meadow White Pontia helice
The Meadow White is one of the Pieridae (Whites, Tips and Yellows) subfamily Pierinae (Whites and Tips).
Meadow White is a small to medium-sized butterfly with a wingspan of 35-45mm. Its markings resemble the common migratory Pioneer Caper White Belenois aurota, but it flies more slowly and lower down. It settles often and is fond of flower nectar. It’s a pretty little insect with its underside marked in shades of green and yellow. The sexes are similar, with the female having black marks at the inner margin of the forewing and along the outer margin of the hindwings where the males are plain white.
Meadow White is often one of the first butterflies to emerge in spring.
Distribution
Meadow White occurs throughout South Africa, particularly in grasslands. It typically does not frequent forests but it can be found almost everywhere apart from the hottest and most humid places. It’s also found in Namibia, Angola, Botswana, Zimbabwe and Mozambique. In East Africa it’s replaced by the Northern Meadow White, Pontia johnstonii.
Egg
Meadow White
Pontia helice
Meadow White eggs are typical of the family Pieridae: bottle-shaped, tapered at the top, with vertical ribs connected by horizontal cross-ribs. They are pale yellow, changing colour to dull orange if fertile. They are 1mm high by 0.5mm diameter, with 12-13 vertical ribs and 30-35 cross-ribs.
They are laid on the flowers, ovaries, and pods of the host plant. The egg stage lasts about five to nine days.
Caterpillar
Meadow White
Pontia helice
Fully-grown Meadow White caterpillars are yellow with green underparts and stripes of green and bluish-grey.
They have rows of black dots and those at the front of each segment are outlined with orange.
They grow from 1mm to about 20mm in two to four weeks depending on conditions; there are usually four moults.
Pupa/Chrysalis
Meadow White
Pontia helice
Meadow White pupae are attached to leaves or stems of the plant by a tail hook and a silken girdle spun over their ‘waist’. This holds them tight to the surface; they don’t hang down from the tail like Nymphalidae or from the girdle as do Swallowtail pupae and some other Pieridae.
They are variable in colour, some being greyish-green with yellow stripes, or pale purple or grey-brown with yellow stripes.
The pupa is about 18mm long. The pupal stage lasts from four days to two weeks depending on climate conditions.
Host plants
Meadow White caterpillars feed on plants in the Brassicaceae family, which often grow in gardens. Indian Mustard Brassica juncea, Garden Alyssum Alyssum minutum, and Cultivated Rocket Eruca sativa are popular host plants. In the wild they occur on Virginia Peppercress Lepidium virginicum and its relatives. It also uses Hedge-mustard Sisymbrium officinale and Yellow Mignonette Reseda lutea.
Virginia Peppercress
Lepidium virginicum
Meadow White female laying on Rocket
Eruca sativa
How to attract them
Gardeners can promote the presence of this butterfly by cultivating its preferred host plants.
Meadow White is the only member of the African Pieridae that it’s easy to get onto garden plants. To market gardeners who grow Indian Mustard and Rocket commercially it’s seen as a ‘pest’ but the caterpillars are solitary. They are far less destructive than the invasive Cabbage White Pieris brassicae to which this butterfly is related.
Like most butterflies they welcome open sunny areas with lots of flowers to visit for nectar.