Butterflies in Coney Island

Since its official opening to public in October 2015,  Coney Island Park has become a popular and relatively untamed wilderness for hiking and cycling in  north-eastern Singapore. Also known as Pulau Serangoon, the Island has been enlarged significantly, doubling its original size to about 100 hectare through a series of land reclamations .  

Apart from its interesting history (read here), natural habitats such as the grasslands, mangroves and the casurina woodlands are deliberately kept intact. 

There are two main trails about 2-km long connecting the east and the west entrances.  The well-paved trail along the eastern coastal offers us scenic views of the skylines and bridges in Punggol waterfront housing estate.    

One of the permanent residents of this tranquil island is a slow-flying migrant butterfly - the Tawny Coster (Araea terpsicore). Sometimes, we could see a large colony of them fluttering around and feeding on wild Biden flowers. 

Another shot - a male specimen.

The beauty of this male Blue Pansy butterfly (Junonia orithya wallacei)  certainly attracted our attention if we happen to see it.

 

Quite often, we can spot another beautiful butterfly feeding on flowers, - the Common Tiger (Danaus genutia genutia).

Another male specimen was seen feeding on the Leea rubra  flowers near the west entrance.

 

Shooting the undersides is a great challenge as they rarely open their wings fully for a sufficiently long period of time for us to snap a few shots. This is a female.

A male here

A solitary Blue Glassy Tiger (Ideopsis vulgaris macrina) was resting on a leaf surface but it just took off after just one shot.

During a few outings there, I noticed that there were not many skippers at Coney Island. We usually encountered orange skippers such as the Lesser Dart (Potanthus omaha omaha).

The genus Telicota species are similar to the Potanthus species. This one looks like a male T. colon stinga.

Its upperside shot.

The Blues (lycaenids) seem to be more common. This Silver Forget-me-not (Catochrysops panormus panormus)   was spotted near the west entrance. 

A look-alike lycaenid, the Forget-me-not (Catochrysops strabo strabo) was shot on the same day.  

The Cycad Bue (Chilades pandava pandava) is a lot more common than the previous two species - a high perch shot.

The Common Tit (Hypolycaena erylus teatus) flew past me and perched on a leaf. Before I could snap another shot, it scooted off.

When a small  but scintillating blue butterfly zipping past me, I would normally show a great interest in tracking it. It turned out to be a Dark Caerulean (Jamides bochus nabonassar).

The Bush Brown butterflies tend to flutter at ground level and blend quite with the environment. This looks like the Long Branded Bush Brown (Mycalesis visala phamis) resting on a small rock.

 
I have mixed feeing when I saw a long stretch of hoardings being put up about 500m away from the east entrance - there will be another outward bound training site in a few years' time.

I hope the relevant authority has carried out a few biodiversity surveys of the area before these hoardings were erected.