Butterflies of Langkawi Part 3

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Many adult butterflies do not restrict their food source to just the nectar from flowers. Mud puddles, bird droppings, secretions from animals, plant saps, fermented fruits, moist soils and salt solutions are some other common sources of diet for adult butterflies. Butterfly photographers therefore always look for possibilities to make butterflies engaging themselves in puddling activities as puddling-butterflies offer good shooting opportunities for us to capture their beauty and elegance in their natural behaviour.  

Over the years, I often noticed  butterflies from the  Papilionidae family had a strong tendency to puddle on moist ground. Let me begin with a series of three Common Jay (Graphium doson evemonides) pictures as shown below.

What did you see in the above three pictures? I didn't notice that there was a spider on the ground when I took the first shot. I was puzzled when and how the spidert had landed on the forewing tip the next moment shown in the next two photos. The fate of this Common Jay was unknown to me when it took off.

This is Papilio nephelus annulus. I misidentified this to be the Blue Helen (Papilio prexaspes prexaspes) initially - thanks Dr Seow from the ButterflyCircle forum for correcting me.

This pristine Tailed Jay (Graphium agamemnon agamemnon) stayed away from a group of puddling butterflies - that was good for me to take an unobstructed shot of its posture.

It was a great pity that this upperside shot of another Tail Jay late in the afternoon when it was sunbathing  at the entrance to a forest trail at Lubuk Semilang did not reveal the green spots fully.  

Among the puddling Papilionidae butterflies, we often find the Blue Jay (Graphium evemon eventus). In fact, I wasn't keen to take this shot until another Blue Jay presented me a rare occasion of displaying its uppersides infront of me under the hot afternoon sun.   

The Green Jay (Graphium arycles arycles) was rather uncommon as we saw only one individual throughout the trip.

Only one male Great Mormon (Papilio memnon agenor) joined a few other puddling butterflies. Occasionally he took a short rest on a leaf near by. 

This is how it looked like when he was on the ground

This Wizard (Rhinopalpa polynice) came down to puddle at CH's location when I was at another place prowling along a forest trail. Fortunately, I came back on on time to snap two shots before it was chased away by an ant. 

The Little Banded Yeoman (Paduca fasciata fasciata) was a small skittish  fellow that made me putting in lots of effort in snapping a few shots. 

It kept flapping its wings while it was feeding on the ground.  I had to go down low on the ground to "fire" rapidly just to capture the moment when its wings were folded. .

The Little Yeoman displayed the same behaviour as the Little Banded Yeoman -flapping its wings constantly.

However, it did become docile after it had enough fluid-intake. Now it rested on a wooden step of a bridge at the Seven Well Waterfall.

It was quite abundant as we could see a few of them at another location. This fellow was quite "drunk:" which stayed rather still, giving me a bit more time to take this underside shot.

A lonely Striped Blue Crow (Euploea mulciber mulciber) appeared for a while before it went into hiding.  I noticed that  different butterfly species came down to feed on the damp soils at different times.

Some species from the Pieridae family were also keen puddlers. This prominent butterfly is the Orange Albatross (Appias nero figulina).

In contract, the Common Albatross (Appias albina darada) is less appealing to the eyes.

This is another specimen taken at the same location as the above shot.

A lonely Tree Yellow (Gandaca harina distanti) was photographed along a river bank.

Some lycaenid butterflies like to puddle also. For example, at least half a dozen of  Sumbeams (Curetis bulis) were found at two different locations.

Another shot of a C. bulis at a different location  Lubuk Semilang.

This upperside shoe should be useful to confirm the identification of the species.

This Ciliate Blue (Anthene emolus) was smaller than a typical specimen found in Singapore.

At the end of each long day of butterfly-hunting and photographing in the wild, we would browse and process some of the photos in the comfort of the hotel room,  enjoy the scenic sew views afar before we went for dinner.  I would never forget such a spectacular sunset in Langkawi.         

Next post : Skippers of Langkawi

Butterflies of Langkawi Part 2

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The area of  the main island of Langkawi is about 32 thousand hectares and about 2/3 of the main island is covered by forests, mountains and natural vegetation. The weather wasn't too bad on most of the days but towards the late afternoon it usually turned cloudy. Let me begin with some perching butterfly shots taken on the first day. 

A Pointed Ciliate Blue (Anthene lycaenina miya) welcomed me when we reached Lubuk Semilang on the first day afternoon.

A very similar species, Ciliate Blue (Anthene emolus) can be identified easily by a a black spot on the base of the  hindwing but this one looked rather small to me.

This Yellow butterfly, a Eurema species  is not the same as what I usually saw in Singapore When it  fluttered, a "black bar" on the upperside wings across the abdomen could be seen clearly. This is  Eurema nicevillei - the identification was confirmed when I had a chance to look at the uppersides. 

I spotted a few Fluffy Tit (Zeltus amasa) at Lubuk Semilang and the Seven Wells area.

Another specimen perching high on a leaf.

We went to the Seven Wells (Telega Tujuh) waterfall area on our second day (14 Dec). It wasn't a good day for me as I had problem getting the correct focusing settings on my new D7000 camera. 
Worst still, an important document dropped off from my pocket when I was shooting a puddling butterfly on the ground. Very luckily it was picked up by Mr Teo later (thanks again, Mr Teo) 

There weren't many puddling butterflies along a river bank. This Yellow looks like the Erema simulatrix but it looked larger than the usual size.

This is a Common Tit (Hypolycaena erylus teatus) sucking the moisture on a rock along a river bank.

Enough of puddling butts, let us go back to the forest trails. A female Simiskina pharyge deolina was found along a shady forest trail leading to the the waterfall at Lubuk Semilang.

The left hindwing of this Lemon Pansy (Junonia lemonias lemonias) was slightly deformed. Just like other Pansy, it is a sun-loving species that like to flit around on a open patch of grassland.

The female Magpie Crow (Euploea radamanthus ramanthus) is rarer than the male. I could only get a long distance shot as she was just too shy to come down.

However, there were a few rather alert males teasing us.

There were a few Crow butterflies fluttering along the shady trail leading to the Lubuk Semilang waterfall. I could only id it as Euploea sylvester harrisii after checking my reference book.

This beautiful Clubtail with a yellow abdomen female Pachliopta neptunus neptunus raised my excitement a few times - but getting a decent shot was extremely difficult as she kept fluttering without stopping while looking for the host plant to lay eggs. I was rather lucky to spot this female high on the tree on the last day - I supposed she was trying to lay eggs. 

The colour of the Knight (Lebadea martha martha) is slightly different from what we usually see in the southern part of the Malayan peninsular and Singapore.

Let me change the focus here, showing a rather small lycaenid resting on a leaf at one shady corner in the breeze - this is the Quaker (Neopithecops zalmora zalmora).

This mating pair of Coelites epiminthia epiminthia was spotted by CH early in the morning on the last day when two of us were at Lubuk Semilang again - very skittish pair and we had no chance for a close-up shot.

A different sub-species of the Common Palmfly, this one should be a Elymnias hypermnestra tinctoria as it showed a clear orange patch on the upperside forewing.

A Dark Glassy Tiger (Parantica agleoides agleoides) was resting on a twig high on a tree - that gave me good chance to get a blue sky shot.

To be continued.

Butterflies of Langkawi Part 1 (Arhopala species)

The AirAsia flight AK1703 on 13 Dec 2012 was slightly late when it arrived at the Langkawi International Airport. My last visit to Langkawi, an archipelago of about 100 islands in the Andaman Sea, was about three decades ago when I was still a university student. Thanks CH for making all the bookings for us to make this trip possible.

The taxi fare from the airport to Bayview Hotel was $RM24 dollars. Within 30 minutes, we arrived at the Kuah Town where the hotel is. Shortly after checking into our room, Mr Teo called his taxi-driver friend to pick us up at the hotel lobby - heading out to Lubuk Sembilang in the afternoon for our first "butterfly-hunting" session.

Let me begin with all the Arhopala shots that I took in this trip - most of the shots featured here were taken along a forest trail leading to the waterfall at Lubuk Semilang. Thanks Dr Seow for identifying many of the shots which I had posted in the ButterflyCircle  forum.

The most abundant Arhopalas was this Arhopala democritus democritus. I must say that the uppersides of this species was beautiful with its very intense and brilliant blue iridescence.

This is a rather large Arhopala species. It took off a few times whenever the flashlight was fired. At last I got a decent record shot from a long distance.

It was so sensitive to the flashlight that it "jumped" whenever I snapped a shot. With this lucky upperside shot, I could identify it as The Large metallic Oakblue (Arhopala aedias agnis).  

This is the Arhopala evansi that I took in the late afternoon at the entrance to a forest trail at Lubuk Semilang. 

A tailless Arhopala agesilaus was resting on a leaf surface after it got used to my persistence of chasing and flashing.

Characterised by the small tornal white dot and a rather wide bow-shaped marking in space 1b on the hindwing, this is Arhopala moolaiana .

A rather pristine Arhopala lurida was found at the end of the foret trail just next to the  Lubuk Semilang waterfall. 

The Malayan Oakblue (Arhopala myrzala lammas) was rather rare in Singapore but it was quite common at Lubuk Semilang.

 A mating pair was shot on the first day late afternoon.

Another species that we can find in Singapore, the Arhopala atosia - but this particular specimen has lost its tails.

Another look-a-like - any idea what this is ? It seemed to have lost its tails also ?

After shooting in the late afternoon, the same taxi driver (sorry, I have forgotten his name - a very nice man who could understand simple English) would drive us back to the hotel. After washing up and a good dinner at a nearby Chinese food stall, we would walk around the town to do some shopping. The day ended with reminiscence of  how some shots were missed or taken, processing the photos and "whatappsing" friends and family members in the comfort of our hotel room.  

To be continued.