Comprehensive Report Species - Limenitis archippus

Concept Reference: Opler, P. A., and A. D. Warren. 2002. Butterflies of North America. 2. Scientific Names List for Butterfly Species of North America, north of Mexico. C.P. Gillette Museum of Arthropod Diversity, Department of Bioagricultural Sciences and Pest Management, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, Colorado. 79 pp.
Concept Reference Code: B02OPL01EHUS
Name Used in Concept Reference: Limenitis archippus
Taxonomic Comments: A widespread species with some geographical and much individual variation. Two subspecies are almost universally recognized: floridensis (mainly Florida) and obsoleta (southwestern USA and adjacent Mexico). Subspecies lahontani (Nevada) is more or less transitional to obsoleta. Subspecies idaho needs to be reevaluated. It is close to typical archippus but probably shows some tendency towards lahontani. Based on the illustrations in its description and examination of additional published illustrations and specimens of eastern viceroys, dorsally idaho seems to fall mostly within the range of variation of northern transcontinental viceroys but the ventral tan areas are paler than at least eastern populations (D. Schweitzer).

NatureServe Status

Global Status: G5
Global Status Last Reviewed: 14Jun2016
Global Status Last Changed: 01Sep1998
Ranking Methodology Used: Ranked by inspection
Rounded Global Status: G5 - Secure
Reasons: Widespread and common; adapts to some disturbance.
Nation: United States
National Status: N5 (01Sep1998)
Nation: Canada
National Status: N5 (17Aug2017)

U.S. & Canada State/Province Status Due to latency between updates made in state, provincial or other NatureServe Network databases and when they appear on NatureServe Explorer, for state or provincial information you may wish to contact the data steward in your jurisdiction to obtain the most current data. Please refer to our Distribution Data Sources to find contact information for your jurisdiction.
United States	Alabama (S5), Arizona (S4), Arkansas (SNR), California (SNR), Colorado (S5), Connecticut (S5), Delaware (S5), District of Columbia (SNR), Florida (S5), Georgia (S5), Idaho (S3), Illinois (S5), Indiana (S5), Iowa (S4), Kansas (S5), Kentucky (S5), Louisiana (S5), Maine (S5), Maryland (S5), Massachusetts (S5), Michigan (S5), Minnesota (S5), Mississippi (S5), Missouri (S5), Montana (S5), Nebraska (S4), Nevada (SNR), New Hampshire (S5), New Jersey (S5), New Mexico (SNR), New York (S5), North Carolina (S5), North Dakota (SNR), Ohio (S5), Oklahoma (S5), Oregon (SNR), Pennsylvania (S5), Rhode Island (SNR), South Carolina (S5), South Dakota (SNR), Tennessee (S5), Texas (SNR), Utah (SNR), Vermont (S5), Virginia (S5), Washington (S4), West Virginia (S4S5), Wisconsin (S5), Wyoming (SNR)
Canada	Alberta (S3S4), British Columbia (SX), Manitoba (S5), New Brunswick (S5), Northwest Territories (SU), Nova Scotia (S5), Ontario (S5), Prince Edward Island (S4), Quebec (S5), Saskatchewan (S4)

Other Statuses

NatureServe Global Conservation Status Factors

Range Extent: >2,500,000 square km (greater than 1,000,000 square miles)
Range Extent Comments: Southerb Canada; US except for Pacific coast and higher Rocky Mountains.

Number of Occurrences: 81 to >300

Population Size: 10,000 to >1,000,000 individuals

Other NatureServe Conservation Status Information

Inventory Needs: Need to track status of ssp. obsoleta at state level in Ariz. and N.M., apparently gone (extinct) in Calif.(?).

Global Range: (>2,500,000 square km (greater than 1,000,000 square miles)) Southerb Canada; US except for Pacific coast and higher Rocky Mountains.

U.S. States and Canadian Provinces

Due to latency between updates made in state, provincial or other NatureServe Network databases and when they appear on NatureServe Explorer, for state or provincial information you may wish to contact the data steward in your jurisdiction to obtain the most current data. Please refer to our Distribution Data Sources to find contact information for your jurisdiction.

Endemism: occurs (regularly, as a native taxon) in multiple nations

U.S. & Canada State/Province Distribution
United States	AL, AR, AZ, CA, CO, CT, DC, DE, FL, GA, IA, ID, IL, IN, KS, KY, LA, MA, MD, ME, MI, MN, MO, MS, MT, NC, ND, NE, NH, NJ, NM, NV, NY, OH, OK, OR, PA, RI, SC, SD, TN, TX, UT, VA, VT, WA, WI, WV, WY
Canada	AB, BC, MB, NB, NS, NT, ON, PE, QC, SK

Range Map
No map available.

U.S. Distribution by County
State	County Name (FIPS Code)
AZ	Graham (04009), Maricopa (04013), Pima (04019), Santa Cruz (04023)*
NE	Dawes (31045)
NV	Churchill (32001)*, Elko (32007), Eureka (32011), Humboldt (32013), Lander (32015), Lyon (32019), Pershing (32027), Storey (32029), Washoe (32031)
WA	Douglas (53017), Grant (53025)

* Extirpated/possibly extirpated

U.S. Distribution by Watershed
Watershed Region	Watershed Name (Watershed Code)
10	Upper White (10140201)+
15	Upper Gila-San Carlos Reservoir (15040005)+, San Simon (15040006)+, Upper Santa Cruz (15050301)+, Rillito (15050302)+, Lower Verde (15060203)+
16	Upper Humboldt (16040101)+, Middle Humboldt (16040105)+, Lower Humboldt (16040108)+, Truckee (16050102)+, Pyramid-Winnemucca Lakes (16050103)+, Granite Springs Valley (16050104)+, Carson Desert (16050203)+
17	Moses Coulee (17020012)+, Lower Crab (17020015)+, Salmon Falls (17040213)+

+ Natural heritage record(s) exist for this watershed
* Extirpated/possibly extirpated

Basic Description: Butterfly, Nymphalidae. The "Viceroy".
Habitat Type: Terrestrial
Non-Migrant: N
Locally Migrant: N
Long Distance Migrant: N
Palustrine Habitat(s): Bog/fen, FORESTED WETLAND, Riparian, SCRUB-SHRUB WETLAND
Terrestrial Habitat(s): Cropland/hedgerow, Grassland/herbaceous, Savanna, Shrubland/chaparral, Suburban/orchard, Woodland - Conifer, Woodland - Hardwood, Woodland - Mixed
Habitat Comments: Eastward almost any habitat with willows or small aspens which are the main larval foodplants. Habitats include prairies and dry barrens with small willows as well as wetlands. Westward more riparian and only around seeps or watercourses in arid regions.
Adult Food Habits: Nectarivore
Food Comments: Caterpillar Hosts: Trees in the willow family (Salicaceae) including willows (Salix), and poplars and cottonwoods (including aspens) (Populus). Adult Food: Early in the season when few flowers are available Viceroys feed on aphid honeydew, carrion, dung, and decaying fungi. Later generations feed more often at flowers, favoring composites including aster, goldenrod, joe-pye weed, shepherd's needle, and Canada thistle (Lotts and Naberhaus 2017).
Phenology Comments: In most of the range two to four broods, the first in late spring (usually May or June) the others following at about two month intervals but with stragglers often flying essentially all summer. Third instar larvae overwinter in shelters on the foodplant.

Group Name: Forest or Woodland Nymphalidae

Use Class: Not applicable
Minimum Criteria for an Occurrence: A location where the species occurs, or has occurred, where there is potential for persistence or regular recurrence. Minimally a place where the species has been collected or verified by an expert from a diagnostic photograph and is associated with sufficient suitable habitat to support a population.
Mapping Guidance: Usually habitats will be large blocks of somewhat diverse forest or woodlands. Boundaries of such can be used for mapping. In practice occurrence definition for this group is likely to be extremely difficult in boreal or montane regions with extensive forest lands, but in most such cases these taxa will not likely be mapped. A particularly difficult case would be POLYGONIA FAUNUS SMYTHI. This one probably can at least be assumed confined to higher, cooler northern hardwoods and spruce-fir forests and openings and outcrops in them. Occurrences in this SPECS group should not be based solely on larval foodplants but must also include adult habitat, although in some cases it would be prudent to map foodplant patches. Consult habitat and foodplant comments fields for species-specific information on what constitutes suitable habitat when mapping occurrences for individual species.
Separation Barriers: Generally none or unknown. Many of the species are migratory or at least subject to large range fluctuations and such species can cross virtually any barrier including several kilometers of ocean and cities.
Separation Distance for Unsuitable Habitat: 5 km
Separation Distance for Suitable Habitat: 20 km
Alternate Separation Procedure: If an EO is on an island such as one of the Florida Keys it is reasonable to consider each island as a separate occurrence regardless of distance and even if some movement between islands occurs. Consult habitat and foodplant comments fields for species-specific information on what constitutes suitable habitat when mapping occurrences for individual species.
For regularly recurring "populations" and probably in some other cases for several of these species the Specs for breeding Immigrant Lepidoptera may be substituted.
Separation Justification: Both distances are arbitrary but reflect the near certainty that most of these species are very mobile, many are long lived (at least in the overwintering brood), mostly somewhat to highly migratory, and that persistent populations cannot occur in small scraps of habitat. It is not really known but for most species, defensible persistent occurrences are probably hundreds to many thousands of hectares; or they may occur as metapopulations with adults moving widely between smaller breeding areas (e.g. POLYGONIA PROGNE southward).
Suitable habitat is also problematic and some judgement based on local knowledge may be needed to define it. For example the adult habitat for NYMPHALIS ANTIOPA is primarily forests at least during aestivation, hibernation, and late winter-early spring courtship and mating period but in many regions the breeding habitats are willow swamps and other shrublands or backyard shade trees. While they generally do stay in forests, taiga, woodlands, or openings in them, adults of the boreal POLYGONIA and NYMPHALIS etc. are not restricted to the vicinity of the larval foodplants. Conceptually suitability should be based on adult as well as larval habitat.
Inferred Minimum Extent of Habitat Use (when actual extent is unknown): 2 km
Inferred Minimum Extent Justification: Use either 2 kilometers or the full extent of contiguous or nearly contiguous available habitat, whichever is less. These are not butterflies of small habitats. Obviously many occurrences are much greater than the roughly 1000 kilometers here defined and/or the potentially persistent occurrences is a cluster of numerous small habitats. Where these butterflies occupy vast expanses of habitat they are often landscape level species with undefinable occurrences.
Date: 12Sep2001
Author: Schweitzer, D.F.
Notes: Conceptually separate non-breeding EOs, specifically hibernation or aestivation areas, would be appropriate for some of these species. However since the obvious examples are very common species such as NYMPHALIS CALIFORNICA for example around Mt. Shasta or both widespread eastern POLYGONIA for example in southern New Jersey, this issue is not addressed with these Specs. Such species are unlikely to be tracked or mapped in such places. In fact most years P. COMMA is resident in most of southern New Jersey only from about October through March. As far as known most of the boreal species and montane breeders in these genera occur essentially in the same places year round. As far as known most of the more southern taxa that are likely to be tracked do also. These Specs were written primarily for species of Polygonia and Nymphalis (senus lato) but seem applicable for ANAEA also, although for that genus habitats will seldom permit use of the 20 km distance.

Justification: Use the Generic Guidelines for the Application of Occurrence Ranks (2008).
The Key for Ranking Species Occurrences Using the Generic Approach provides a step-wise process for implementing this method.
Key for Ranking Species Element Occurrences Using the Generic Approach (2008).

NatureServe Conservation Status Factors Edition Date: 02Jul1987
NatureServe Conservation Status Factors Author: Opler, P.A.
Element Ecology & Life History Edition Date: 18May2001

Zoological data developed by NatureServe and its network of natural heritage programs (see Local Programs) and other contributors and cooperators (see Sources).

Allen, T.J. 1997. The butterflies of West Virginia and their caterpillars. Pittsburgh, PA. University of Pittsburgh Press.

Backhouse, F. 2000. Extinct and Extirpated Species. B.C. Minist. Environ., Lands and Parks, Wildl. Branch. 6pp.

Belth, Jeffrey E. 2013. Butterflies of Indiana A Field Guide. Indiana University Press.Bloomington, IN.

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Guppy, C.S., and J.H. Shepard. 2001. Butterflies of British Columbia. UBC Press in collaboration with Royal B.C. Mus. 414pp.

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Klassen,P.,Westwood, A.R., Preston. W.B. and W.B. McKillop. 1989. The butterflies of Manitoba. Manitoba Museum of Man and Nature. Winnipeg. 290 pp.

Lotts, K., and T. Naberhaus, coordinators. 2017. Butterflies and Moths of North America. Available online: http://www.butterfliesandmoths.org/ (Version December 2018).

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Pohl, G.R.� J-F. Landry, B.C. Schmidt, J.D. Lafontaine, J.T. Troubridge, A.D. Macaulay, E.van Nieukerken, J.R. deWaard, J.J. Dombroskie, J. Klymko, V. Nazari and K. Stead. 2018. Annotated checklist of the moths and butterflies (Lepidoptera) of Canada and Alaska. Pensoft Publishers. 580 pp.

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Kingdom	Phylum	Class	Order	Family	Genus
Animalia	Mandibulata	Insecta	Lepidoptera	Nymphalidae	Limenitis


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