Post 2/n from the Shanghai Natural History Museum visit on 22 June 2024. Some butterflies from their butterfly enclosure. No species info provided, but my guess is they are the underside and upperside of an Oakleaf (Kallima), a Swallowtail (Papilio) and a Tree Nymph (Idea).
I spent some hours during the summer night to try to attract moths and others with a UV-light in a lamp and a bedsheet covering a door.
It went pretty well with about 25 moths and the like.
But this one was my absolute favourite! A Common Emerald.
I would never in my life have found it if it wasn't because of the light!
Remembering Dad (who died a year and a half ago) on #FathersDay. It was Dad who encouraged my early interest in #nature and then, when I was in my teens, my passion for #WildlifePhotography.
Here he is in the #garden he loved so much, with some of the #wildlife he captured on camera there. Thanks Dad, and rest well.
Dad's #garden has provided me with many opportunities for #WildlifePhotography over the years, even when he was no longer able to tend to it. Pics here from 2016 to earlier this year, clockwise from top left: Common #Frog, #Robin, Seven-spot #Ladybird, and Brimstone #Butterfly.
A Pale Mottle (Logania marmorata) spotted at the Railway Corridor near Buona Vista, Singapore, on 7 June 2024. It looked like a little blinking fairy when in flight.
The Pale Mottle is a small, odd butterfly that feeds on excreted aphid fluid when adult, and on the aphids themselves when it is a caterpillar.
The Dark Tit (Hypolycaena thecloides) and Common Tit (Hypolycaena erylus), spotted at Sungei Buloh Wetland Reserve, Singapore, but on different days. The Dark Tit is much rarer than the Common Tit, and to the untrained eye, they both look much the same. One difference is the extra brown mark on the hindwing of the Dark Tit.
This lil Monarch chonk has now eaten the second Aquatic Milkweed down to its stems, save for one section of it. Hungry and happy. Hoping there’s enough left for it to pupate and do its thing
Please don't let anyone intimidate you out of gardening. Or make you feel like your efforts aren't good enough, or that you're not knowledgeable or wealthy enough to even try.
Last year I posted a collage of butterflies I'd recorded in my garden. And I said that gardening doesn't have to be elaborate or expensive. Wildlife will appreciate any attempts you make to provide them a home.
I got a "well actually..." reply cutting me down & implying I was being elitist.
It has bothered me ever since.
To me, "gardening" just means growing stuff. It doesn't matter if it's just a few flowers on a patio, or if your "flower pots" are scavenged from a recycle bin, or if your "soil" is just dirt scraped up from somewhere.
The butterflies literally will not care if your marigolds came from Walmart.
Snobbery is a human thing. Please don't let it stop you from gardening in whatever way or capacity you want.