Parnassius phoebus, known as the Phoebus Apollo or small Apollo, is a butterfly species of the swallowtail butterfly family, Papilionidae, found in the Palearctic and North America. P. phoebus is found in the Alps, Urals, Siberia, Kazakhstan, Mongolia, China, Alaska and Canada south through the United States to Utah and New Mexico.

Description

Male: the costal spots of forewing usually without red, the anterior one sometimes with white pupil; submarginal band faint and abbreviated or interrupted; no spot at hind margin; hindwing with red ocelli which are usually small, and sometimes with a submarginal row of feebly marked black spots; the veins often marked with well-defined elongate black punctures. Female: with better defined and more extended markings; vitreous margin of forewing separated from the submarginal band by large white uniform spots; the second costal spots often pupilled red, connected with one another by black scaling, on disc sometimes blackish shadows; on hindwing a greyish vitreous marginal band, distinct submarginal half-moons, which are contiguous, forming a band, two larger red ocelli, the posterior one occasionally with white pupil; anal spots sometimes intensified and one of them filled in with red.

Habitat

Mountains at 1,600 to 2,800 meters, in particular between 1,800 and 2,200 meters above sea level, in humid damp and wet places such as edges of mountain streams and near springs and fresh seepages and in valleys (Schneetälchen) according to the preferences of its caterpillar food plant.

Larval foods

Subspecies

P. phoebus has the following subspecies:

Similar species

Parnassius smintheus, which is a closely related species found in North America, is often misidentified as Parnassius phoebus. Some researchers also tend to split the North American population of Parnassius smintheus into two or three species, the northernmost of which are usually regarded as being part of P. phoebus, while the rest is considered to be P. smintheus.