Setting up a Butterfly Park - Thailand

[wendy]

Hi All,

We are currently in the process off looking into setting up a butterfly park in Thailand. We know very little so are hoping we will be able to gain support and learning with your guidance. The butterfly park is going to be set up with the ethos of informal education and conservation we will not be pinning butterflys to peaces off cardboard.
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We have set up what I call a petrol station outside our home on the edges of the jungle by adding flowered plants, fruit and rotten fish which does attract butterflies for short periods of time.

We are planning on going to see a number of other butterfly parks in Thailand and Malaysia to see how they are set up and managed. However we will still need ongoing information and support. We have started to keep a daily diary off activity in the garden with photos of butterflies seen and are currently in the process of trying to identify them which would seem not to be a very easy task:hmmm: .

As we know so little about butterflies we would really appreciate some direct in the following arrears (any books web sites that you think would be helpful.)

1. Identification of south East Asia Butterflies.
2. Food sources and plants.
3. Breeding – looking after your caterpillars
4. Were to purchase live Butterflies for breeding.


Thanks once more we look forward to reading your feed back :bsmile:

[Sky Blue]

Hi Wendy,

Setting up a butterfly park is not a simple task I guess. You may want to start small at the beginning by planting some of the common host plant that attract butterfly (e.g. Lime tree, Palm tree)

I guess the main problem for butterfly park to survive is to have the ability to have no-stop supply of butterfly from in-house breeding program. Thus you need enough food plant for the start.

You may want to take a look on the thread I posted recently: "Breeding areas of Phuket Butterfly Garden (http://www.b-pals.com/forums/showthread.php?t=4800)", that might give you some hint.

Food sources and plant for butterfly in Thailand might not be similar to those we have here in Singapore, best way will be on field observation & to know the native host plant for a particular butterfly species that you've encounter.


regards,
Soon Chye

[wendy]

Hi Soon Chye,

Thank you for your reply your photos are very interesting and useful it is good to see how breeding is taking place. Do you have any more photos of butterfly’s been breed or photos of butterfly houses as I would love to see them. We will be visiting Puket very soon with the view off spending a couple of days at the butterfly house. Do you have a name off someone who we could contact direct to arrange a detailed tour or even training?

Are you aware if they are able to provide a consultancy service similar to Penang Butterfly House http://www.butterfly-insect.com ? As they offer a number of different services:

- Planning and developing butterfly and insect houses or flight aviaries.
- Planning and developing of butterfly gardens.
- Site assessment for new development.
- Eco-Tourism lectures and training.
- Advice on endangered and protected species.
- Feasibility studies.
- Customize Butterfly and Insect Museum setup.


I will look up the two host plants (e.g. Lime tree, Palm tree) The difficulty I am finding at the moment is accessing information on the web that relates specifically to Thailand Butterfly’s I seem to be able to find almost every other country but Thailand. Maybe I am looking in the wrong place? I imagine that the butterfly’s here are quite different the ones you have in Singapore.

I did try to identify the butterfly’s that spend some time in the garden but I have found it to difficult by just using the web :sweat: . So have now changed my planes I will now try and identify five common butterfly’s to Thailand and research them. I also have to be very careful here as I live in a national park and it is illegal to capture any animals / insects. So we will have to purchase live pupa from commercial retailers / providers. If you are aware of any please fell free to send me there web of email link.

We will defiantly start small be initially setting something up in our own garden before we commit to the setting up of a Butterfly House as this will be costly. Another avenue I will also be looking into at a latter date is to see if we are able to receive and funding but for the moment one step at a time.

I have attached a photo of a caterpillar I took it outside the front of our house sometime ago. I do not now its name but it’s really beautiful.

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Thanks once more:)

[Common Mime]

The caterpillar in your photo seems to belong to moth...

[wendy]

Sorry I was not sure if it was a butterfly or moth how can you tell what should I be looking for :hmmm: ?

Does anyone have any notes on how I can start field observation so I can deturmin native host plants of local butterfly’s.

Ta very much

[Painted Jezebel]

Hi Wendy,

Best of luck in setting up your butterfly park. You asked for resources on the butterflies of Thailand. There is a book, published in 2006, Butterflies of Thailand by Pisuth Ek-Amnuay, which I have just come across, which is very useful, includes foodplants etc. Also, there is a six volume work by Brother Amnuay Pinratana which you may wish to get, but it is more expensive.

With regards to online resources, try John Moore's site www.thaibugs.com/butterflies.htm which is brilliant for the species of northern Thailand. Where are you based? If you are in Southern Thailand, I may be able to help as I am on Koh Samui. I am preparing a similar website to John's, but it is not ready yet. (I have only been here one month, from England!).

Les Day

[wendy]

Hi Les,

Thanks for your post.

Over the last four weeks or so we have made a filed trip to Phuket Butterfly Farm. I have been trying to peace together the horticultural and entomological sides of butterfly gardens / farming in Thailand by using the internet. We have made a local contact with a representative from The National Park and identified training in butterfly conservation with Roger Kendrick, Kadoorie Farm & Botanic Garden in Hong Kong.

We came across Butterflies of Thailand by Pisuth Ek-Amnuay 4 weeks ago while we were in town it was the only Englkish book in the shop which we thought was rather strange it is incredibly helpful.

Things are moving forward but very slowly if I am honest the biggest problem is the identification of hostplants. I have spent hours on the internet trying to identify plants but seem to be having little success.

I originally started by identifying the butterfly by using Butterflies of Thailand and cross referenced it with The Natural History Museum (London) data base which through up discrepancies this left me feeling very confused. So we made the decision to use Butterflies of Thailand book as our main reference book for identification and hostplant.

However I?m still finding the identification of individual hostplants for a specific butterfly very difficult well impossible. Identifying information on a family hostplant is ok but even finding information on tropical plants native to Thailand I am having difficulty with. I am going to contact a live insect provider directly to see if they will be able to provide some information on the host plant so if the worst comes to the worst I will have to purchase live pupa from a supplier and grow the hostplant. The only issue with this is that it is likely that the butterfly will not be native to Thailand which I am not happy about but do recognize it will be a starting point. Maybe I?m just not searching effectively on the net or that Iam missing the information I am looking for because I am not familiar with ecology terminology. This is a new area of expertise for use so it?s all a bit over whelming. We will have a look for the other books you recommended by Brother Amnuay Pinratana hopefully we will be bale to find them.

We are based in Trat just next to the Cambodian Border not to close to Koh Samui. Your offer of help would be great I am just not sure what type of support you are able to other so you will have to let us no. Have you given any though regarding coming across to this side off Thailand or are you staying on Koh Samui ?

[wendy]

These pictures were taken at Phuket Butterfly Park which I would like to name and get more information on. I thought the forum members may be able to help by providing information. I am looking for the name of plant and the name of the butterfly that uses it for egg laying.

Sorry that they are not better quality but I seem to be having problems resizing them. As I have made them smaller the quality of the image is lost as this process appears to make them go out of focus. .

Thanks

Pic 1
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Pic 2
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Pic 3
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Pic 4

[Silverstreak]

Wendy,

May be you can also tell us what type of caterpillars you saw feeding on them. That will make identifying them simpler.

#2 Looks like a Hygrophila spp. possibly Hygrophila pogoncalyx. refer here (http://biotech.tipo.gov.tw/plantjpg/1/Hygrophila%20pogoncalyx.jpg)



#3 is Ricinus communis (Castrol oil Plant) refer here for more infor. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Castor_bean)