Abstract: Butterfly courtship behavior is a research hotspot for insect behaviorists and evolutionary biologists. In this review, we summarized the general patterns of butterfly courtship behavior and the mechanisms of species and sex recognition during courtship. The courtship behavior begins with finding and locating a mate, followed by flight pursuit, and finally completing the mating. During this process, butterflies need to identify conspecifics and their mates, and detect female mating status. Butterflies rely on visual cues (wing stripe, wing color, and UV reflectance) and olfactory cues (sex pheromones and insect body volatiles) to discriminate conspecifics and their mates. However, there are differences in the relative importance of these two cues. Males discriminate female mating status mainly based on body volatiles and flight attitude. How olfactory communication occurs in male butterflies without scent scales and hairpencils, and the application of new tools used for behavioral observation, have yet to be thoroughly investigated. Exploration of courtship behavior and signal utilization in butterflies will provide more knowledge on behavior of adult butterflies, and lay the foundation for deeper understanding of interspecific and intraspecific communication of butterflies.

Key words: insect, butterfly, courtship and mating, visual cue, olfactory cue, mate recognition