There are innumerable species of butterfly that exist on earth and each species has a different life span. So, no particular number of days or months can be used to describe the exact lifespan of a butterfly. However, it is estimated that on an average, a butterfly’s lifespan is not more than 20-40 days. In butterfly species, the maximum lifespan recorded till date is 1 year, while the minimum considered life is merely 3-4 days. The butterflies that have the shortest lifespan are the small blue butterfly and the copper butterfly. The one that has the maximum lifespan of 1 year is the giant ‘monarch butterfly’. The beautiful Painted Lady butterfly has an average lifespan of nearly 2 weeks.
Here are some very interesting facts about the lifespan of butterflies:
• The total considered life of any butterfly species depend on various factors, such as time of year, latitude, flights taken for migration, availability of food, and local climatic conditions.
• The entire life of a butterfly is divided into 4 stages — Egg, Caterpillar, Pupa, and the Adult. The entire lifespan refers to the total time spent by the butterfly in the last three stages of its lifecycle.
• Majority of the species spend 1-2 weeks in the adult stage of their life cycle.
• On comparing the lifespan of the female and male butterflies, it was observed that the female butterflies tend to live a little longer than their male counterparts.
• Butterflies that take merely one flight each year have a lifespan of 12 months. On the other hand, butterflies that take 2 flights every year have a lifespan of just 6 months.
