The Least Skipper is a butterfly that is from the Hesperiidae family. The Least Skipper is found in eastern parts of the United States.
What Does the Least Skipper Look Like?
The Least Skipper has wings that are round and their antennae do not have hooks and are checkered. The male Least Skipper does not have the smelling patches called stigma that attract the female.
The Least Skipper has wings that are a dark brown or black color and the back wings have orange and brown or black bands. The bottom of the wings are orange and the back wings are a little darker. The back wings sometimes have white looking veins going through them.
The Least Skipper has a wing span up to 26 millimeters.
Where Does the Least Skipper Live?
The Least Skipper lives in Eastern United States. Their habitat is that they like tall grasses and habitats that are wet or moist.
Other Species
There are four different species in the Skipper range including the European Skipper, the Orange Skipperling, the Tropical Least Skipper and the Southern Skipperling.
The difference is that the European Skipper has wings that are more pointed. The Tropical Least Skipper has more orange. The Orange Skipperling is very bright orange and the Southern Skipperling is smaller than the Least Skipper.
When is the Least Skipper Most Active?
The Least Skipper is most active from May to September in the northern states and from February to December in the southern states and in Florida they live all year around.
Finding a Mate
The male Least Skipper will look for a mate by flying through the grasses. The female Least Skipper will lay one egg and the eggs are yellow and will have an orange or red ring down the middle of it.
The caterpillar will have four white pairs of wax glands on its abdomen and its head will be brown or tan and it will have a white or black stripe on its back.
What Does the Least Skipper Eat?
The Least Skipper butterfly will drink nectar from the cultivated rice, bluegrass, cordgrass, marsh millet and other flowering plants.
More Facts About the Least Skipper:
- The Least Skipper has a weak flying pattern and they do not fly well and are considered skipping when they go from plant to plant.
- The Least Skipper caterpillars hibernate when the weather is cooler.
- The Least Skipper likes to live by streams, ditches and tall grasses.
What Did You Learn?
What is the Least Skipper? The Least Skipper is a butterfly that is found mostly in eastern United States.
What does the Least Skipper like to eat? The Least Skipper likes to drink nectar from flowering plants such as bluegrass, marshes, and cultivated rice.
Why is the Least Skipper called that? The Least Skipper does not fly well and it looks like it is skipping when it flies.
How many different species of the Skipper are there? There are four different Skipper species including the Tropical Skipper, European Skipper, Orange Skipperling and Southern Skipperling.
Where does the Least Skipper habitat? The Least Skipper’s habitat is an area that is moist close to a stream or tall grasses.
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