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The nominal taxon Euploea tulliolus goodenoughi Carpenter, 1942, based on a unique crow butterfly collected on Goodenough Island in 1913, is shown to represent a small, aberrant female of the locally common Euploea leucostictos eustachius (Kirby, 1889). This new synonymy invalidates the only previous record of the Purple Crow, Euploea tulliolus (Fabricius, 1793), from the islands of Milne Bay Province, Papua New Guinea. However, two female Euploea tulliolus collected from islands in the Louisiade Archipelago during 2010 are reported here, constituting the first valid records of the Purple Crow from the Milne Bay islands.

Thoracic temperatures of two species of unpalatable danaine butterflies in Papua New Guinea were high, exceeding ambient temperature on average by 5-5?C. Males and females of both species flew under conditions of intense solar irradiance, and in most cases showed significant regulation of thoracic temperature. Thoracic temperature excess was not, however, positively correlated with solar irradiance, body mass, or wing loading. In general, equilibrium temperature of a flying butterfly is influenced by choice of microhabitat, flight metabolism, and convective cooling. Interactions between these factors can be complex, and may alternatively result in thoracic temperatures close to ambient (as reported previously for unpalatable neotropical butterflies), or in a high thoracic excess, as exemplified by the danaine butterflies considered here. Association between palatability and thermal biology in butterflies thus has a variety of possible outcomes. Key-words: Danaine butterfly, palatability, Papua New Guinea, thermoregulation