This species is distinctly a southern form occurring as far west as the Mississippi River throughout the more Southern states. As one would expect in the long seasons and warm climate of this region there are several broods each year and the caterpillars often hibernate as well as the chrysalids. The adult butterflies are lovers of the sun and are said to roost at night upon the tops of live oak and palmetto trees. =The Zebra Swallowtail= _Iphiclides ajax_ Most of our Swallowtail butterflies are so distinctive in form and colors that they are easily distinguished from one another, but the Zebra species is so different from all the rest that when it is once seen it is likely always to be remembered. The striking combination of green and black stripes with very long tails, set off by beautiful crescents of blue and of red, at once distinguishes this fine butterfly in any of its varying forms. Three distinct forms of this species occur, namely: _Marcellus_, the early spring form, small in size with short tails, that show white only on the tips; _Telamonides_, the late spring form, somewhat larger, with tails a little longer and showing more white on the outer half; _Ajax_, the summer form, decidedly larger with tails very long. It would be a comparatively simple matter to understand these forms if they were simply seasonal variations, with three broods, each form succeeding the other as the season advances. But this is far from being the case. We have instead the most complicated and confusing series of conditions imaginable--conditions for which no one has yet given satisfactory explanations. To make a fairly clear statement of what happens, suppose we assume that we start with twenty over-wintering chrysalids. In April ten of these disclose their butterflies which are Marcellus, the early spring form. In May the other ten disclose their butterflies which are Telamonides, the late spring form. We thus have these two forms, appearing successively in spring from the same set of over-wintering chrysalids. After flying about for a short time the Marcellus or early spring Swallowtails lay eggs upon the leaves of papaw trees or bushes. These eggs soon hatch into caterpillars that feed upon the leaves and grow rather rapidly. A little more than a month later they mature into butterflies which are Ajax, the summer form. In a similar way the Telamonides or late spring butterflies lay eggs soon after they appear, also upon papaw leaves, and these eggs in about a month mature into Ajax, the summer form. So we have Ajax, the summer form, developing directly from both the early spring or Marcellus and the late spring or Telamonides butterflies. These Ajax butterflies in their turn lay eggs for caterpillar young. These soon mature into a brood of butterflies which are of this same Ajax form. There may be successive broods through the summer, practically all of them being this same Ajax summer form.