Dear Friends, The question raised here is a very important one.
As every one in this group shares an interest in butterflies, i am sure nobody here intentionally do any harm to the butterfly population. The errors committed may be due to lack of knowledge, carelessness, pure ignorance or as Dr Kalesh pointed out - irresponsibility. I agree with Blaise - New comers in the field should be supported in their work on butterflies - either field study or life cycle study. But they should be guided positively so that they will not repeat the same mistakes the previous workers did while documenting or researching on butterflies. 'Expert' is a mere terminology - no body is an expert in the full sense - in any field. Errors are human but when we make guidelines based on our experience, repetition of the same errors can be avoided. I think Rohan too is of the same opinion - that's why he raised this question. What he expect from all of us is a practical guideline for collection and rearing which is applicable to everybody in this group including himself. The number of cats collected - depends on the intention of the collection. Groups of cats may be collected for protection or for research purposes. The main point raised by Blaise is about the rearing of species already reared earlier. The host plant of most of the species varies in different localities. If your intention is conservation of butterflies in your area, the first thing you should do is the identification and conservation of the host plants. Observation of life cycle is the best way to locate and confirm the plants used. Those who have done a single life cycle study know the numerous difficulties they faced while doing so. I think Somebody with only an intention to photograph a newly emerged butterfly will become thoroughly disappointed when he pass through such burdens. He will get hundred such shots with much ease in the field ! Regards Saji --- In [email protected], rohan lovalekar <rohan.lovalekar85@...> wrote: > > Dear Friends > Few days ago we had an email regarding leaves required for Red Pierrot > caterpillars. Said person collected 35+ caterpillars of Red Peirrot and ran > out of leaves. I still didnt understand the thing of collecting 35 > caterpillars. What is need of collecting so many caterpillars when u didnt > have leaves to feed them. i really feel sad abt the fact that no one on our > group has asked that person to leave the caterpillars on plant and rear > only few caterpillars. Instead all of us shared host plant name with it. I > think one or two caterpillars are sufficient for purpose of documentation. > One might argue that many caterpillars die due to infection, parasites etc. > I think all the people who are interested in documenting life cycles should > think twice before collecting caterpillar from the field. As a community of > Butterflyindia we should take some responsibilty towords conservation of > butterflies. > > Regards > Rohan Lovalekar > -- Enjoy
