Delightful Surprises

When I was thinking of writing this post, I was going to title it 'Unexpected Surprises' but then I realized a surprise is by definition unexpected and so that was a rather redundant description. So let's title it delightful instead for it was certainly delightful.

If you've read my other posts, you'll know by now that I'm quite the butterfly seeker. I love butterflies and have been known to chase them for a considerable time every once in a while. I don't exactly look out for them consciously but, after over twenty years' of practice, I find them quite easily. I just notice them. It's become System 1.

So imagine what it's like when I didn't find it but it found me!

That was exactly what happened today. I was out on the rooftop garden at my workplace after lunch as usual when I noticed a little movement. I looked down and lo and behold, a butterfly had landed on my mask! Thankfully that mask was hanging on my bag. If I had been wearing it I would have only been confused.

Just look at it!

As far as I can tell it's a Line Blue Butterfly but I can't tell which one. Maybe a Tailless Line Blue? It looks the closest (See more here and here for the various Line Blues!) I don't think I've ever noticed it before though, much less gotten a picture of it. Isn't it adorable?

And it found me!

Unexpectedly Happy,

May

P.S. The irony of a Line Blue landing on a blue mask does not escape me. It even crawled around for a bit. Perfectly happy I see. That makes two of us!

Butterflies Galore!

 At the rooftop garden at my office, butterflies are a common sight. Grass yellows, lemon immigrants, and a couple of pansies are normal. However, every once in a while, there comes so many butterflies that your heart goes wild at the sight of them. And they can come so close! There might even be a couple of surprises among them.

Today was such a day and it was difficult to keep from dancing along at the sight of so many wonders weaving and twisting all about me. I came across some old friends too, made some new ones, and, of course, took some pictures. I absolutely love my phone camera. The 10x zoom is wonderful.

First of, some old friends. A Chocolate Pansy. I see these all the time but rarely do I get a chance to take a good photo or video of them. I quite failed at the picture this time but look at the video!

If you hear a high pitched noise somewhere, that's me squealing in delight. (Yes, I am born in the year of the Pig and am allowed to squeal in happiness once in a while. It's a privilege of the zodiac.) I mean, look at it! I've only seen such shots in documentaries and those videos they use to sell TVs. And I managed to take it! Wheee!

Next up is a new friend. This was fiendishly difficult to identify but I think it's most likely a Small Branded Swift. (See more here). The problem with identifying butterflies is that the change in the placement of a white mark or the number of dots or the tiniest detail is the difference between one butterfly and another. Also, the Small Branded Swift is known to have many lookalikes so, take this identification with a pinch of salt. All I can say for sure is that it's probably a swift.

Still, I'm so happy with this picture. I've fallen in love with my phone camera all over again.

Do excuse the high pitched noise. I can't help it. It's so sharp! Boy am I glad that swift stayed still then. It kept going from flower to flower. Taking pictures of butterflies is as much a test of patience as endurance. I still remember going after that Blue Pansy when I was in JC. I must have spent ages chasing it down to the amusement of all watching. Still, I got a good picture out of it (A Blue Pansy).

Speaking of pansies, I found another friend from the pansy family. This one is comparatively elusive. I see Chocolate Pansies all the time and Blue Pansies I see every once in a while but this one I hardly come across. 

It's a Peacock Pansy! Lovely isn't it. This one was sunbathing some distance away so I thank God for my high quality zoom once again. Gosh, so many pretty butterflies today. I was over the moon. They are just soooo pretty!

I think the rest of the garden had had enough of my squealing though and so plotted a surprise to shock me back into my usual senses. There is a spider I often see in the lift lobby on the way back up to work. It's a jumping spider so you can guess that it's about 1.5 cm big which is pretty big for a jumping spider. Today, I opened the door to the lift lobby expecting to see it again and instead saw....

GAH! I said 1.5cm not this almost 15 cm monster. It was right in my face too so it gave me a scare. Here's the door for a size reference. It's an enclosed space. How did it get in there?

I certainly stopped squealing,

May.

Urban Wildlife

Strange things happen sometimes. My office isn't close to any natural reserve or forest or even any proper gardens (unless you count the more concrete than grass roof garden I frequent every lunch). No, it is close to offices, the MRT, more offices, a busy road, hotels, and very urban buildings in general. Yet, wildlife seems to just pop up at times.

For instance...

This female common flameback woodpecker I found clinging onto the glass as I walked to work this morning. What is it doing there? I don't see any secondary rainforests, mangroves, or any proper urban parks near woodlands here.

Do you?

Thinking it got lost,
May.

Can't Exercise

 Like the header says, it's near impossible to exercise in my new neighborhood. Rest assured, it's not due to the fault of the amenities or anything like that. Don't go complaining anywhere. I wouldn't. But yes, alas, it is simply impossible. You mustn't blame me either - Ok, maybe you can. But not in this instance - After all, how can you expect me to just keep walking when...

There are so many butterflies! XD

I am on leave so I took a walk this morning in the garden and I must confess I hardly walked at all. I kept stopping and stopping and trying and failing to take a picture of all the butterflies I saw. Here's a list of them.

• Grass Yellows (of course)
• Striped Albatross (And there were so many! I have never seen so many before at one time!)
• I suspect a female Striped Albatross too (among the many, many, many males)
• Leopard (of course. I was by their tree)
• Plain Tiger
• Peacock Pansy
• Chocolate Pansy (I think. I think I only saw this very briefly or I might have mixed it up with yesterday when I definitely saw it....or maybe it was the day before...)
• All those little butterflies like Lesser Grass Blues that were too quick and landed too infrequently for me to identify
• A mysterious larger than Lesser Grass Blues but smaller than Grass Yellow butterfly I saw in the distance but couldn't identify. It was white and had a similar structure to a Lesser Grass Blue but with a tip at the end of it's tail and a hint of orange at the back near that tip. (Alas, this description is still too generic for me to identify it)

And all in the span of thirty minutes! How can I exercise I ask? How can I walk? I can't. I must stop and look and admire and try, even if I fail, to take a picture. You can't expect a butterfly lover to just walk past all these.

It's simply impossible.

Should be walking but keeps on stopping,
May.

P.S. This is on the 26th of June 2024. I can't fantom why Blogger says it is on the 25th. The date and time setting is fine on the posting site. Maybe it's a bug....How ironic.

P.P.S Ok, I've fixed it. How did blogger get the idea I was on the other side of the world in Los Angeles? I wouldn't mind visiting California again though. I would love to return to Yosemite National Park, Muir Woods, and Monetary Bay Aquarium.

At Last!

I am very fond of butterflies and some of the most common I see are the Grass Yellow butterflies (there is more than one species but I'll just use a generic Grass Yellow to refer to them. I can't tell if they are speckled, common, or chocolate when they are in flight.). With them, I would often come across another larger, lighter yellow butterfly, the Lemon Emigrant.

This is flighty butterfly. I have rarely seen it land and, despite my efforts, I had never been able to take a picture of it. It's impossible to take in flight and, whenever it does land, it always flies off again before I can take a picture. I almost expect it to fly off the moment I take out my phone.

Until today.

Yes! At long last, today at my workplace's rooftop garden, a Lemon Emigrant landed near me repeatedly and stayed still. I managed to take not just one but several pictures! This is the best among them.

I am so happy. At last! I finally managed to take a picture of a Lemon Emigrant! I did it!

And I came across some other things too.

Here's a yellow vented bulbul...

and a randomly large mushroom I found.

Some days are just filled with delightful surprises.

May 

New Estate, New Garden, Happy Me

 So, it's been a while. Guess that's what happens when life happens. Well, call it a time skip as they call it in the books and comics and take it that the past 6 or 8 years led to progress, growth, and an increase in skills without needing to know the details. Considering the length of time and my age, I'm certain I managed to do all three.

But that's hardly what I want to write right now. I've recently moved to Singapore's newest estate and, if you don't know it's name, I shall not spoil the surprise. Suffice to say it's in the west and is Singapore's first 'Forest Town'. I personally feel it's closer to a garden town. I'm almost living in a garden. It's literally outside my window.

Which is amazing! I get birds and butterflies in the middle of the day and I get to see it all without leaving my room. Though, some things are still best seen in person so, this morning, I finally took a walk around the estate - I am not counting my first night time walk which was rudely interrupted by a stomachache - and got to see the sights. It was shortly after breakfast in the cool of the morning and boy did I find things!

First up was the millipedes. Typical of a new estate, they were everywhere. Hordes and hordes of them all wiggling about. I must confess, I rather look up and at my surroundings than down but I had no choice if I wanted to avoid stepping on the millipedes. They were all over and they move so it's impossible to simply pick a path and walk casually. If you don't cross their path, they cross yours.

And I thought the slugs at my office's rooftop garden were hard to handle. At least those are slow. Well, never mind cause near one of the fitness corner, I found something that sent me over the moon.

Butterflies!

And not any butterfly, Leopard butterflies (Find out more about them here)! They are my old friends from primary school and I released one during my science club butterfly breeding days. It was the privilege of being the youngest and I've been fond of Leopards ever since. There were at least six of them around the trees; four of them flying about in pairs and two mating. I suspect they were around one of the their host plants, the Rukam Masam (Details here). I took a picture of the mating pair and guess what? Upon returning home I found a pupa in the picture too! Can you spot it? I'll give you a hint. It's green and above the mating butterflies. Look slightly to the left.

What a find. And, just in case anyone else lives in this area and wants a look, these are the trees. It's the one with the reddish leaves near the fitness corner.

Remember though, leave the butterflies, pupas, and caterpillars in the wild and do not bother them. It's their garden. We are just visitors. Most of the caterpillars and pupas in my school's butterfly breeding program died. Out of so many, only one became a butterfly. It's a grim statistic I still remember.

Moving on with my walk, I also came across some other plants. First was the Arabian Jasmine which I smelled before I recognized and which are incredibly fragrant. I also came across a bush of Cape Honeysuckle near one of the blocks. Alas, Google's latest capability of identifying plants with Google Lens also meant I forgot to take pictures of them. So please refer to these links instead.

Arabian Jasmine: https://www.nparks.gov.sg/florafaunaweb/flora/4/3/4343

Cape Honey Suckle: https://www.nparks.gov.sg/florafaunaweb/flora/2/4/2498

I did take a picture of one flower though, the one below. It's lovely isn't it? That's why I took a picture before I searched it up. It has a lovely pinkish red hue. I simply had to admire it first.

Isn't it lovely? You think so too, right? Just look at it.

Yes, look at it but don't let its beauty fool you, Ladies and Gentleman, for that is no mere flower. That is an Oleander. Now I hear a gasp from some of you while the rest may be confused by my theatrics (except my sister, who knows I am dramatic about many things). This time, I assure you, my theatrics are well placed because, my dear readers, an Oleander is famous for one thing besides its beauty.

It is deadly.

Ok, but only if you eat it. An Oleander is poisonous if ingested which, in my opinion, is a very good reason to check before putting anything into your mouth. However, like so many poisonous things, it can also have medicinal properties (See WebMD) though chances are you are likely to be poisoned before receiving the medicinal effects. Its sap can also cause a rash so I would recommend not touching this plant (I'm glad I didn't!). Here's the Npark's factsheet on it. It really is the same plant written in WebMD. (NParks Oleander)

Though, if you don't eat it and don't touch its sap, I think this plant is quite safe. It is a lovely ornamental flower and I suspect it may be more common than we think. After all, it is also known as a garden plant.

The sun got hot after this and, although it's only two days in, June is still June which is still hot so back home I went. I guess I'll take another walk again someday when it's cooler. For now though, I'm happy to watch from the comfort of my room.

Till the next time, 

May.