In some species courtship is very brief (click here to compare this with the courtship of the Marbled White), in others it is protracted and involves complex rituals.

	Male and female Wood Whites Leptidea sinapis for example are often seen sitting facing each other, exchanging chemical messages with their white-tipped antennae.
	The male repeatedly flicks out his long proboscis, whipping the female alternately on the underside of her left and right wings. Both sexes periodically flick open their wings, and it is clear that the butterflies are communicating something. The ritual does not appear to instigate copulation, so the nature of the "messages" is unclear.

The female Wood White then searches out suitable plants to lay her eggs on - various members of the pea family growing on the edges of woodland rides.