News Life

It’s true: Butterfly spots can mimic scary eyes

Novel computer test for birds revives notion of wing markings’ evolution

Owl Butterfly

SCARY SPOT  The owl butterfly, sporting some of the more eyelike spots on its wings, stars in a new wave of rigorous testing for the old saw that the spots resemble scary predator eyes.

Cláudio Dias Timm/Flickr (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)

By Susan Milius

- More than 2 years ago

Big spots on butterfly wings actually can mimic the eyes of predators, a new study finds, reviving a partly discredited textbook truth with fresh evidence.