Papilio cresphontes vs Heraclides

Butterfly Identification
1

Why will ebutterfly not recognize our submission of Giant ST, Papilio cresphontes?

1 Like
2

Hi @plkleinsasser , thanks for your question

Recent taxonomic updates have reclassified the Eastern Giant Swallowtail from Papilio cresphontes to Heraclides cresphontes.

So, I recommend you submit your species using the latter scientific name.

I hope this answers your question

-Rodrigo

3

Thank you, I will update our sheets to reflect that change.
How can we keep up to date on taxonomic changes? I run a volunteer butterfly survey for 2 institutions and apparently we have old books and old species sheets.
None of us are lepidopterists but have learned in the field. Any suggestions how to keep up to date?
Thank you
Sincerely, Pam

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4

That is an excellent question! Keeping up with taxonomic changes can be quite challenging, and even we are struggling to keep up. We have a few recommendations that might help:

  1. Utilize our AI identification tool. We have put significant effort into updating the taxonomy within our AI, so most of the recommendations should be accurate. However, if the AI doesn’t find a match with the current taxonomy, it will return the species name as “N/A”. In such cases, you can explore the second option.

  2. Reach out to us by sending a message, either via this platform, through the help button located in the lower right corner of the screen, or to my email e.butterfly.help@gmail.com.

  3. You can also consider cross-checking the taxonomy of your butterfly on other sites, such as [Butterflies of America] (https://www.butterfliesofamerica.com/).

I hope this information was helpful

Best,

-Rodrigo

5

Thank you so much.