A New Butterfly Garden at Tampines

A New Butterfly Garden at Tampines
Tampines-Changkat Community Garden

Some time back on 3 April 2011, a small 'ground-breaking' ceremony took place at the open space next to Block 124, Tampines Street 11. The ceremony was for the community residents to be introduced to a new butterfly garden. The brainchild of the Member of Parliament for Tampines-Changkat, Ms Irene Ng, the butterfly garden would be a new eco-friendly initiative to create a butterfly-conducive habitat for residents and nature enthusiasts to enjoy.

Noting that "there are few butterflies around Tampines as they are sensitive to fogging and pesticides" MP Irene Ing said that the butterfly garden is intended to create a natural setting with butterfly hostplants and nectaring plants to attract these flying beauties to this little patch of green amongst the residential blocks.

As the butterfly garden and the construction of a circular enclosure took place, the community centre's staff and a group of enthusiasts from the Residents' Committee realised that they were not familiar nor knowledgeable enough with the ecology of butterflies to attract them to the proposed garden. One of them approached me to give the community members and enthusiasts a talk about butterflies.

When I visited the new butterfly garden that was under construction, I noted that there were a few improvements that could be made to the design of the enclosure. For one, due to the flat top design of the circular enclosure there were 'angles' that would trap the butterflies within the enclosure. Another oversight was a stepped concrete bridge that allowed an elevated platform within the enclosure. This was not particularly handicapped-friendly. However, as the construction of the enclosure was already at an advanced stage, there was little that could be done to improve the design.

On 23 Sep 2011, I conducted an introductory talk about butterflies at the Tampines-Changkat Community Centre's hall. I was pleasantly surprised at the rather good turnout of about 80 residents and enthusiasts, many with their children in tow. There to grace the occasion, was the MP for Tampines-Changkat, Ms Irene Ng, and her husband, Graham Berry.

The attentive crowd was entertained by the many new facets about butterflies that they weren't aware of. And they also learnt not to kill off the 'ugly-looking' caterpillars that would one day turn into beautiful butterflies!

At the end of the talk, there were many questions from the residents, and Brian Goh, ButterflyCircle's youngest (but very knowledgeable!) member, sportingly helped to answer some of the questions. He impressed the crowd with his knowledge about butterflies - even at his tender young age!

Before Irene left for another function, she presented me with an autographed copy of her recently-launched book, "The Short Stories and Radio Plays of S. Rajaratnam". Of course, I reciprocated her generosity with a copy of my book in return.

For those who did not know, Irene is also a fellow-Penangite. Before joining politics, she was the Senior Political Correspondent of The Straits Times. Irene has won several journalism and writing awards. She is currently the Writer-in-Residence at the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, besides being a Member of Parliament with a very busy schedule!

Upon completion, the Tampines Butterfly Garden was finally launched on 26 Nov 2011. Irene penned a short article on her Facebook page. Prof Edwin Thumboo even wrote a short poem, reproduced here from Irene's FB page :



















Butterflies

Below circling, housing skies
Lovely, delicate patterns glow.
Touch gently, with your eyes,
Then feel radiant colours flow

Into each busy, bustling day,
Enriching all you do, and say

Prof Edwin Thumboo

With help from the National Parks Board, the right balance of host and nectaring plants was selected, and coupled with tender-loving care from a few enthusiasts amongst the Tampines residents, the little enclosure is now teeming with butterflies. Although the netting material of the enclosure is unsuitable for smaller species of butterflies, it does well enough to contain the larger and more showy species.

When I visited it recently, there was quite a decent amount of butterfly activity with the common urban species like the Mottled Emigrant, Common Mormon, Plain Tiger, Autumn Leaf, Common Mime, Great Mormon and Common Grass Yellow flying and feeding on the Lantana and Pagoda Flowers.

There were even a couple of photographers who told us that they came all the way from Toa Payoh after learning about this new Butterfly Garden at Tampines!

I hope that the external areas around the enclosure can be expanded with more plants and walkways so that more butterflies will visit the area, so that visitors can enjoy free-ranging butterflies, and not just those that are flying within the enclosure. It was encouraging to see that many enthusiastic residents of the area were already helping to tend to the plants and also breeding various species of butterflies to release at the Butterfly Garden.

So here we have, thanks to MP Irene Ng, a new community garden for butterflies at Tampines, and for the residents to enjoy the beauty of nature's flying jewels! It will hopefully be another shining example of community gardens within the heartlands that would encourage other constituencies to set up their own butterfly gardens to encourage the conservation of Singapore's butterfly fauna.

Text by Khew SK : Photos by Gilbert Quek & Khew SK

A Season for Red, Green and Black!

A Season for Red, Green & Black
ButterflyCircle Wishes One and All a Merry Christmas and a Happy 2012!

 


 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

It's the Chrismas and the holiday season again.  As people from all over the world are preparing for a nice sumptuous dinner, merry-making and spending time with family and friends on Christmas Eve, let's remember to spread a little cheer and love to those who are less privileged or alone. 

 

On the personal front, it has been an extremely busy and challenging year, as my company prepares for an exciting future ahead with a new shareholder.  2011 has been a year of new experiences - both happy and sad, where I bade farewell to long-time colleagues and welcomed new ones.  The year ahead will be fraught with challenges and new relationships, but one which I look forward optimistically to.  It will be a time for great change and many personal quests. 

 

I am also glad that ButterflyCircle has had many new and capable members joining us and taking the high-quality photography and research work to newer heights.  The spirit of sharing and camaraderie has never been stronger, and we even have active and knowledgeable junior and senior members coming on board with us. 

 

We look forward to many new discoveries for Singapore in 2012, many of which are already under preparation for addition to the Singapore checklist after final scientific validation by a few experts.  I am optimistic that the Singapore butterfly checklist will reach 310 species by the end of the new year! 

 

ButteflyCircle would like to take this opportunity to wish all our members and friends from around the world a Merry Christmas and a Happy 2012!  May our Beloved Flying Jewels continue to survive and thrive on our lil' island in the sun! 

 

Note on Photo : A shot of Singapore's little 'red spitfire', the Common Red Flash (Rapala iarbus iarbus) sunbathing on a blade of grass in the nature reserves.  The little fast-flying butterfly is very local in distribution but can be common in the special locations where they are found.  Males tend to dog-fight in the late hours of the day and stop with their wings spread open as in the photo, showing their attractive crimson uppersides. 

Life History of the Common Posy

Life History of the Common Posy (Drupadia ravindra moorei)

Butterfly Biodata:
Genus: Drupadia Moore, 1884
Species: ravindra Horsfield, 1828
Sub-species: moorei Distant, 1882
Wingspan of Adult Butterfly: 20-32mm
Caterpillar Local Host Plants: Saraca cauliflora (Leguminosae, common name: Yellow Saraca), Desmos chinensis (Annonaceae, common name: Dwarf Ylang Ylang), Dimocarpus longan var. malesianus  (Sapindaceae, common name: Wild Longan), Lithocarpus elegans (Fagaceae, common name: Spike Oak), Agelaea macrophylla (Connaraceae).

A male Common Posy.

Physical Description of Adult Butterfly:

Above, the male is dark brown on the forewing (which also bears an obscure orange discal patch in some specimens) and is purplish blue on the hindwing for most of the lower portion; the female is dark brown on both wings (with traces of an orange discal patch on the forewing) and a series of marginal black spots on the pale bluish tornal area of the hindwing. Underneath, both sexes are alike in having mostly orange forewing and mostly white hindwing. The forewing has post-discal and discal series of faint black striae while the hindwing is marked with prominent bold black bands and spots. The tornal area of the hindwing bears bluish scales up to vein 3. A long filamentous tail occurs at the end of vein 2. In contrast, two much shorter tails occur at the end of veins 1b and 3 respectively.

A female Common Posy.





Field Observations of Butterfly Behaviour:

The Common Posy is relatively common  in the nature reserves of Singapore, but with its occurrence mainly confined to the Central and Bukit Timah catchment reserves. The adults typically fly in a hopping fashion, and they have been observed to sunbathe with their wings opened flat in sunlit conditions. The species have been observed to be attracted to the plant sap exuded by young shoots of Leea indica and Smilax bracteata.

Early Stages:

The immature stages of Common Posy are polyphagous. To date five plants have been recorded as its local hosts. Caterpillars of all instars feed on young and tender leaves of the host plants. They are also polychromatic in the early instars, occurring in either a green form or a pink form.

Local host plant : Desmos chinensis.

A mating pair of Common Posy.

Eggs are laid on the underside of a young leaf or other parts of a young shoot of the host plant. The white egg, about 0.9mm in diameter, is shaped like a lightly flattened chinese bun with its surface  covered with numerous polygonal pits. The polar pit holds the depressed micropylar.

An egg laid on the young shoot of Desmos chinensis.


Two views of an egg of the Common Posy. Diameter: 0.9mm.

Each egg takes about 2 to 2.5 days to hatch. The young caterpillar emerges after nibbling away sufficiently large upper portion of the egg shell. Measured at a length of about 1.3mm, its pale yellow  body bears long whitish setae dorso-laterally and laterally. Its head capsule is pale yellowish, and both its prothoracic shield and anal plate are colored as per the body base colour.

Two views of a newly hatched caterpillar of the Common Posy, length: 1.3mm

As the caterpillar grows, raised tubercles become apparent on the dorsum, one pair to each of 2nd-3rd thoracic segments, and one to each 1st-7th abdominal segments. The body colour is pale yellowish green as the caterpillar grows and feeds on the plant materail.This instar lasts for about 2 days with the body length reaching up to 3mm.

Two views of a 1st instar caterpillar, length: 2mm.

Covered with numerous short setae, the body of the 2nd instar caterpillar is either whitish with a pale green undertone or yellowish with a dark brown undertone. Each of the 2nd and 3rd thoracic segments has a pair of dorso-lateral conical projections, whilst each of the first six abdominal segments have a short conical projections, taller than those on the thoracic segments. These projections are yellowish brown around the tip and whitish at the base. The growth in this stage brings the caterpillar to a length of about 5-5.5mm, and after about 2 days in this stage, it moults again.

Two views of a 2nd instar caterpillar, length: 3.3mm.


Two views of a 2nd instar caterpillar of a different colour form,  length: 4mm.


Two views of a 2nd instar caterpillar, late in this stage, dormant prior to its moult, length: 5mm.

The 3rd instar caterpillar resembles the 2nd instar caterpillar closely with minor changes observed. The dorsal projections on the abdominal segments are now longer and pointed than those on the thoracic segments. This instar takes about 2 days to complete with the body length reaching about 8.5-9mm before the next moult.

Two views of a 3rd instar caterpillar, pink form, length: 7mm.


Two views of a 3rd instar caterpillar, green form, length: 8mm.


Two views of a 3rd instar caterpillar, late in this stage, dormant prior to its moult, length: 8.5mm.

The 4th instar caterpillar ushers in a drastic change from the 3rd instar: A diamond-shaped marking formed by a reddish brown line running from the dorsum of the 1st abdominal segment to the side of 5th abdominal segment, and then back to the dorum of the 7th abdominal segment, and straight on to the posterior end. The dorso-lateral pairs of projections seen on the 2nd-3rd thoracic segments in earlier instars are no longer discernible. The body base colour is yellowish green in one form and yellowish pink in another.  This instar lasts about 3-4 days with length reaching 17-18mm.

Two views of a 4th instar caterpillar, early in this stage, length: 13.5mm.


Two views of a 4th instar caterpillar, length: 16.5mm.


Two views of another 4th instar caterpillar, length: 17mm.


Two views of a 4th instar caterpillar, late in this stage, length: 17mm.

Towards the end of the 4th instar, the caterpillar ceases eating and wanders around for a pupation site. At this time, the caterpillar's body changes to a dark purplish brown coloration, and in some specimens, with a green underdone in the abdominal area. It typically chooses the underside of a stem or branch for its pupation. Here, the pre-pupatory larva spins a silk girdle and a silk pad and then anchors itself on it in a head-down posture.

Two views of a pre-pupatory larva of the Common Posy.

A Common Posy caterpillar molts to its pupal stage.

Pupation takes place after one day of the pre-pupal stage. In a typical colour form, the pupa is brownish with with whitish streaks/patches in the thorax and wing pads, and has a large and similarly coloured dorsal patch on the abdomen. In another form, the brown is replaced by black and the abdomen is coloured similar to the thorax. Length of the pupa: 12-13mm.

Two views of a typical pupa of the Common Posy.

Two views of another pupa of the Common Posy.

7 days later, the mature pupa turns dark in the dorsal and wing case areas, and yellowish brown elsewhere. The next day the adult butterfly emerges from the pupa.

Two views of a mature pupa of the Common Posy.

A newly eclosed Common Posy resting near its pupal case.

References:

• [C&P4] The Butterflies of The Malay Peninsula, A.S. Corbet and H.M. Pendlebury, 4th Edition, The Malayan Nature Society.
• Butterflies of Thailand, Pisuth EK-Amnuay, 1st Edition, 2006.

Text by Horace Tan, Photos by Benedict Tay, Mark Wong, Loke PF, Anthony Wong, Federick Ho, Khew SK  and Horace Tan

Book Review by Dr Albert Orr

Book Review :

A Field Guide to the Butterflies of Singapore

by Dr Albert Orr

204 Australian Entomologist, 2011, 38 (4)

BOOK REVIEW

A Field Guide to the Butterflies of Singapore by Khew Sin Khoon. Ink on Paper Communications Ltd, 2010; xxv + 342 pp. Price (in Australia) $50. ISBN 978 981 08 7018 8 (paperback).

The city state of Singapore is home to nearly 300 species of butterfly. Perhaps this richness should come as no surprise for a place which styles itself as the ‘Garden City’ and which lies just off the tip of the Malay Peninsula, itself boasting nearly 1000 species; nonetheless it is an impressive total given Singapore’s small area of just 700 km2 and largely urban environment.

This charming book is the first ever to depict almost all species currently known from Singapore. A glossy production in standard octavo field-guide format, it begins with a concise but adequate introduction to the butterflies, covering the topics of nomenclature, adult morphology, early stages, ecology and behaviour, where to find butterflies in Singapore (together with a map of local hotspots) and the techniques of butterfly watching and photography.





















A lot of information is packed into a very few pages. A section on how to use the book explains clearly the conventions adopted with regard to describing abundance, habitat, speed of flight and other information.

There follows a family by family, subfamily by subfamily, species by species account. Typically, each species receives a single page, with two pages for the highly polymorphic Papilio memnon agenor (Linnaeus, 1758).

Half the page is devoted to a large scale portrait of the species, typically perching or feeding, occasionally in flight. Virtually every one of these main photos is stunning. In many cases, particularly in the smaller species, individual rows of scales may be discerned, a level of resolution that was almost unobtainable using film.

The main image is supplemented by two thumbnail photos, generally showing a different posture and frequently the opposite side of the wings to those depicted in the main portrait. Each species is identified primarily by an English common name. Many of these have been in use for years but a few are of more recent coinage. However, all are evocative and appealing and give the impression that they have established their worth by natural selection within the very active Singapore butterfly interest group.

Australian readers may be surprised to find that Graphium agamemnon (Linnaeus, 1758) is known as ‘The Tailed Jay’ and ‘The Palm Dart’ is not Cephrenes augiades (C. Felder, 1860) but Telicota augias (Linnaeus, 1763). In finer print is given the full trinomial designation with author and date, its abundance class, ranging from common to very rare, and its wingspan in mm. (Here forewing length would have been a more useful measure, especially as most species are photographed with wings folded). Habitat is indicated by one of four icons: Urban, Parks and Gardens, Forests, Mangroves/Coastal.

Speed of flight is shown on a five point scale from slow to fast. Larval hostplants are listed in another small box (with family names sometimes wrongly italicised). A brief text describes habits, habitats and salient identification features. The formula is extremely easy to use and much information can be obtained for little effort. For ease of reference the six families have a colour code visible along the fore edge of the book when closed.

The book is very definitely aimed at the butterfly watcher and photographer, rather than the collector. Not a single photograph of a dead butterfly appears within its pages. It will, however, surely become indispensable to every local enthusiast and interested visitor to the island state and be useful elsewhere in the region.

Dr Albert Orr

About the Reviewer
Dr Albert Orr is a professional entomologist of 35 years standing. He is a retired lecturer in ecology and invertebrate zoology and has been an Honorary Research Fellow at Griffith University since 1996. Dr Orr is a writer and illustrator, as well as a consultant and scientific editor.

A Selection of Books by Dr Albert Orr

• Butterflies of Australia - Paperback - 2010 ; 336 pages ; ISBN: 9781741751086 - AU $ 45.00
• Dragonflies of Peninsular Malaysia & Singapore - Paperback - 2005 ; 128 pages ; ISBN 9838121037 - S $ 17.90
• A Guide to the Dragonflies of Borneo - Hardcover - 2003 ; 195 pages ; ISBN: 9838120693 - US $ 133.00

Acknowledgments : Special thanks to Dr Albert Orr for reviewing my "Field Guide to the Butterflies of Singapore" in the Australian Entomologist.  The original PDF article can be found here.