Bug FAQRed Peacock
Anartia amathea · Order: Lepidoptera · Family: Nymphalidae
Also called: Scarlet Peacock, Brown Peacock Butterfly, Red Peacock Butterfly
The red peacock butterfly (Anartia amathea) is common in many parts of South America and the Caribbean, including Argentina, Paraguay, Uruguay, Brazil, the Amazon, the Guianas, Venezuela, Panama, Trinidad and other islands. Adults feed on nectar, while larvae have been recorded on plants in the Acanthaceae and Labiatae families. It looks very similar to the banded peacock (Anartia fatima), which lives mainly north of its range.
Source: Wikipedia
How to recognize it
It closely resembles the banded peacock butterfly, Anartia fatima, which is found mainly north of its range.
Source: Wikipedia
What it eats
Adults drink nectar. Larvae feed on plants in the Acanthaceae and Labiatae families, though many host plants are still unknown.
Source: Wikipedia
Where it comes from
The species is primarily South American, with a type locality likely in Suriname and a range from Panama to Argentina, also present on Grenada, Barbados and Antigua.
Source: Wikipedia
Lookalikes
It is very similar in appearance to the banded peacock butterfly, Anartia fatima.
Source: Wikipedia
Where it is found in the US
Recorded in 1 of 51 states and DC. Most records: New Mexico.
Darker = more records. Counts are museum and citizen-science records, not population size.
Source: GBIF
Same family (Nymphalidae)
Sources
- Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anartia_amathea
Look it up elsewhere: GBIF · iNaturalist · BugGuide · Wikipedia
Text written 2026-10-22 from the sources above and checked sentence by sentence against them. Data fetched 2026-10-22.