moth--butterflygirl19mp's Journal

My friend found a weird thing in the grass when we were looking for Hubner’s Wasp Moths and my friend asked what it was so I picked it up and held it close to my face to inspect it. It looked like a stink bug or firefly at first glance, but it turned out to be a moth. My friend lost the moth and we 2 more individuals. I caught one individual to observe. The moth was unusually red, and when I looked for it on the Singapore Moths project, I discovered that it was none other than Phauda flammans. When I went home, I researched more about this creature and learnt that it eats ficus and other ornamentals. I realised that there were multiple ficus trees growing near where I found it. The next day I found more individuals, and more people had found out about these bugs. I also found one with shriveled wings on the ground, it expanded its wings more, but one of the wings were still a bit shriveled. I brought the other specimen home, and put it in a tank with a flower, leaves and a stick too.

I am in Australia at the moment for holidays. Today (23 July 2024), I saw 4 white butterflies, two were noticeably smaller and even though it is winter they appeared. This sighting was not in a heated area, but considering the amount of sun and temperature today(sunny 18 degrees) it was kinda ideal for a few butterflies to be seen. On Sunday, (21 July 2024) I went to a park (Blaxland riverside park) and I saw 2-3 individuals of medium sized butterflies and the temperature was 14-18 degrees. I didn’t take any photos of the butterflies. Maybe the smaller ones were pieris rapae and the bigger ones were belenois java.

One of the Common Mormon caterpillars in my balcony walked away from the host plant and now is in pre-pupation pose on one of my Chinese Violet plants (the biggest one, but it droops like a vine since I repotted it) on the straightest stem.

I saw 3-5 Lemon emigrants 1 was female I think , 1 chocolate pansy I think it was male, 2 male striped albatrosses and 1 or 2 common grass yellows.

There were also some small flowers growing on the ground, looked like Malayan eyebright but slightly bigger and was purple, where I saw a female albatross and the same grass yellow mentioned earlier fluttering around it and I think the grass yellow nectared on it too.