Lions Club Nature Education Centre & Tai Po Kao, Hong Kong

I had to be in HK to resolve a banking issue sooner or later. During a weekly shooting at Lornie PCN in May, I bumped into Ash and got to know that he would be in HK until 7 July. So I decided to join him for butterfly-shooting.  To save time and cost, I booked a midnight CX flight, arriving on a Sunday dawn. 

Within 2 hours of touching down in HK, I arrived at our hotel along Nathen road near Tsim Tsa Tsui  MTR station. Leaving my small luggage in his room, we went for breakfast just next to our hotel. After breakfast, we met our HK friend Wendy at the Yau Ma Tei MTR station and walked to a mini-bus stop, hopping on the bus going to the Lions Club Nature Education Centre in Sai Kung. 

This 34-hectare huge outdoor education centre includes quite a number of smaller themed parks or enclosures such as an arboretum, a medicinal plants garden, a tree nursery and a rock-and-mineral garden etc.   

The cloudy sky and the intermmiten passing rains did dampen my excitement of hunting and shooting in HK again.  However, we still managed to see a good number of Blue Tigers and a few skippers.

 The Restricted Demon (Notocrypta curvifascia) was found at the edge of a lily pond. 

A glimpse of its forewings.

This is a Dark Evening Brown (Melanitis phedima) 

The cooling and poor weather did not stop a large colony of Blue Tigers (Tirumala limniace) from fluttering and feeding on some wild Latana flowers.

We had an early lunch inside this education centre while waiting for the rain to subside. After checking the weather forecast for the rest of the day, we knew that there was no chance of a clear sky. We decided to head back to the bus stop.  Along the way, we saw a shy Punchinello (Zemeros flegyas) hiding behind a leaf.

We found a green praying mantis at the lily pond. Its triangular head was turning and looking at us.

Many thanks to Wendy for spending the day with us.

 

I didn't go out with our HK friends to shoot on Monday 3 July as I went to HSBC Aberdeen branch to  change my mobile number in their system (a mistake made by a counter staff in March). This time, I must thank this young lady who had patiently checked and made sure I could setup and use the mobile and internet banking before I left the branch. After that I visited my ex-colleagues and friends in the late morning and afternoon. 

I resumed shooting on Tuesday and  we met up with our friends again, this time 10 am at Tai Po Market MTR. We took a cab (about HK$25) to the Jc Castle (龍成堡).  We were welcomed by a short-lived passing rain the moment we reached a service road next to this private property. We walked up a tarred road followed by some gradual steps before climbing another long flight of steps to reach the peak - this is the same hill top  that I shot the Papilio agestor (Tawny Mime) before.

This hill top was always crowded with photographs in some months. But this time, six of us had the luxury of space to roam around this small hill top.  I found a rather pristine Shan Nawab (Polyura nepenthes)  resting high on a leaf. 

There were quite a few male Colour Seargents (Athyma nefte) circulating around this hill-top - a typical hill-topping behaviour for finding a mate.

They had the tendency to perch on a high leaf.

There was another Sergeant flying around but it was very active. This is the Blackvein Sergeant (Athyma ranga).

Very often, we could find the Constable (Dichorragia nesimachus) on this peak.

After awhile, it became quite friendly with our presence. Thanks to Lc Lc for being very patient, waiting for us to shoot when it landed on his fingers.

Another common species that can be found here is the Indian Fritillary (Argyreus hyperbius). 

A rather tall flowering tree attracted a few butterflies. This is a Classy Bluebottle (Graphium cloanthus) - a record shot of this fast flyer which didn't stay still on the flowers.

Quite a few lycaenids also came to visit the flowering tree but they looked so small on my camera viewfinder even though I was using a 28-300 mm lens this time. 

This is a rather fading Green Flash (Artipe eryx) perched on a leaf for sometime

We got excited when the rare Royals turned up though high on the tree - there were at least two or three Silver Royals (Ancema blanka)feeding at different flowers.

This was my first sighting and a record shot of a rare Spotted Royal (Tajuria maculata)  

 

The view from the peak (荔枝山 ) is nice

We had about 2 hours of shooting on this peak. Around 2 pm, we noticed that a large patch of dark clouds was approaching us so we decided to depart. True enough, a heavy downpour came the moment we reached a shelter. Once the rain subsided , we walked down the tarred road towards the 松仔園 (Chung Tsai Yuen) direction.


Thanks Wendy, Jacky, LC and one more lady whom I cannot remember her name for accompanying us shooting.

Note:  I remember on the first day of 2018 (I was still working in HK in 2018). I took the train to Tai Wai station and boarded a KTM bus 72 going to 松仔園 (Chung Tsai Yuen). Walking up leisurely along the main tarred road on a nice and early Monday morning, I spotted a skipper puddling on the tarred road from far.  I approached it quickly and to my surprise with great excitement, it was a rather pristine Choaspes benjaminii  or could it be C. hemixanthus? 

Another shot