Butterflies (and moths) belong to the order Lepidoptera. The butterflies seem to have split away from the moths and then evolved over the last 70M years or so to form the six families that we know and love today.
Click on any of the boxes (except, for the moment, Riodinidae -we haven't seen any here-) to see the corresponding information and our photos or drawings (mostly taken in moist limestone forest (Windsor, Cockpit Country) or in dry limestone forest (the Silver Sands area of Trelawny).

I have always had trouble identifying butterflies from the various field guides and the photo of a live Papilio thoa shows clearly how different a live animal is from the dead specimen illustrated, which has the wings relaxed and the pattern destroyed.
We have tried as far as possible to obtain live photos for this guide.

We use Brown & Heineman Jamaica and its Butterflies (1972) as our reference and some of our nomenclature may be dated. To the best of our knowledge, the species listed below are correctly classified, but please if you have any comments.

RIODINIDAE
• We haven't seen any of this family, the "Metalmarks".

LYCAENIDAE
• The Jamaican Blue (Hemiargus dominica)

NYMPHALIDAE
• The Monarch (Danaus plexippus)
• The Danaid Eggfly(Hypolimnas misippus)
• The Many-Banded Daggertail (Marpesia chiron)
• The Antillean Malachite (Siproeta stelenes stelenes
• The West Indian Buckeye (Precis evarete zonalis)
• The Tropical Fritillary(Euptoieta hegesia hegesia)
• The Jamaican White Peacock (Anartia jatrophae jamaicensis)
• The Jamaican Admiral (Adelpha abyla
• The Jamaican Reflecting Butterfly (Doxocopa laure fabricii).
• The Cadmus (Historis acheronta cadmus)
• The Jamaican Satyr(Calisto zangis)
• Julia (Dryas iulia delila)
• The Tropical Silverspot(Dione (Agraulis) vanillae insularis):

PIERIDAE
• The Maerula (Anteos maerula maerula)
• The Greater Antillean White (Ascia monuste eubotia)

PAPLIONIDAE
• The Jamaican Swallowtail (Papilio thoas melonius)
• The Jamaican Giant Swallowtail Butterfly (Pterourus homerus -formerly called Papilio homerus)
• Blue Swallowtail or Jamaican Kite Swallowtail (Eurytides marcellinus)
• The Pelaus Swallowtail (Papilio pelaus pelaus)

HESPERIIDAE
• Pyrgus oileus
• The Common Tailed Skipper (Urbanus proteus)