{"id":19895,"date":"2017-01-31T03:21:56","date_gmt":"2017-01-31T08:21:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/?p=19895"},"modified":"2017-01-31T03:21:56","modified_gmt":"2017-01-31T08:21:56","slug":"the-end-of-the-beginning","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/2017\/01\/the-end-of-the-beginning\/","title":{"rendered":"The end of the beginning"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Otherwise known as January&#8217;s month-end abstract<strong>:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/HindwingAbstract.jpg\" alt=\"tight crop of hindwing of Low&#039;s swallowtail Papilio lowi\" width=\"730\" height=\"425\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-19896\" \/><br clear=\"all\"\/>I said this might be back, and you scoffed &#8211; don&#8217;t deny it, I heard you distinctly all the way over here. So let&#8217;s gaze deep into the hindwings of the Low&#8217;s swallowtail (<em>Papilio lowi<\/em>) and the curious pattern thereon. Don&#8217;t ask me what exactly it accomplishes, but I want you to see something. From a short distance, the wings appear to have gradient tones, shading that almost gives them a three-dimensional shape, but on close examination we can see that the scales come in only two colors, black and pale blue. The shades are produced only by distribution, a lower density of the blue scales giving more of an impression of shadows. This is <em>almost<\/em> a good mimicry of hollow tubes or stems, but there&#8217;s a flaw<strong>:<\/strong> the centerline of each should be the brightest blue to carry the impression, the reflection of more direct sunlight, rather than having a darker line which hints at a hollow or crease. Again, I can&#8217;t think what this is supposed to communicate, if anything &#8211; it might simply be to attract the attention of predators more towards the non-vulnerable hindwings, or it might be a sexual display, or simply something to confound bloggers&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Otherwise known as January&#8217;s month-end abstract: I said this might be back, and you scoffed &#8211; don&#8217;t deny it, I heard you distinctly all the way over here. So let&#8217;s gaze deep into the hindwings of the Low&#8217;s swallowtail (Papilio lowi) and the curious pattern thereon. Don&#8217;t ask me what exactly it accomplishes, but I [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1903,4,3],"tags":[3702,3683,3684],"class_list":["post-19895","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-because","category-nature","category-photo","tag-it-doesnt-take-much","tag-lows-swallowtail","tag-papilio-lowi"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19895","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19895"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19895\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19895"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19895"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19895"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}