Xingxing Glitter Butterfly, Goddess of Joy Glitter Butterfly, Great Blue Glitter Butterfly, Bright Goddess Glitter Butterfly, Emerald Butterfly, Eros Butterfly, Heaven Butterfly, Paris Butterfly... These "foreign butterflies" are famous all over the world for their gorgeous "appearance".
However, at the butterfly release activity held by the Shanghai Zoo today (September 25), the "butterfly compatriots" born and raised in Shanghai used their excellent "appearance" to save their dignity.
From September 26 to October 31 this year, Shanghai Zoo will host the 9th Butterfly Exhibition. In just over a month, about 30 species of nearly 70,000 colorful live butterflies will be released one after another.
Different from previous butterfly exhibitions, most of the butterflies released this year are native species in Shanghai, and with the continuous improvement of the city's natural environment, everyone can see these beautiful elves in the suburbs and even in their own communities.
For example, the male leopard butterfly wearing "leopard print", the green butterfly with green scales on the black "dress", and the citrus butterfly with citrus fruit trees and other rue family plants as the host, its black wing veins with yellow wing bottoms, as if outlined with brush ink, and the dead leaf butterfly, which is one of the most realistic insects in the world, is difficult to see the difference from dead leaves when resting.
At the scene, the reporter also saw many plant branches hanging or glued with various shapes of butterfly pupae, under normal circumstances, more than ten days can be feathered, tourists can see the wonderful process of breaking the cocoon into a butterfly at close range. The park said that fresh butterfly pupae will be added regularly for visitors to see, and the total number will reach thousands.
"We want to use butterflies as a medium to spread the local ecological culture, so that citizens and tourists can further explore the relationship between butterflies and nature on the basis of gradually understanding and mastering butterfly varieties, such as knowing what they call home and understanding the honey source plants that are inseparable from butterflies." Pei Enle, director of Shanghai Zoo, said that in recent years, the park has set up butterfly breeding bases in Yunnan, Jiangsu and other places, focusing on cultivating a large number of local species of butterflies.
At the same time, Shanghai Zoo also works closely with the green garden unit to create a beautiful and comfortable habitat for butterflies with honey source plants with both ornamental and ecological functions, such as bougainvillea, five-colored plum, dragon boat flower, fragrant finches, eight treasure sedum, sage, star flowers, and marie tendons.
In addition to flowers and plants, conditions such as temperature, humidity, and light also have an important impact on the reproduction of butterflies. Li Qing, a technician at the Shanghai Zoo's two climbing pavilions, said that in the butterfly hall of the Shanghai Zoo, the temperature is maintained at 26 ° C to 28 ° C all year round, and the spray is turned on regularly to control the humidity at about 70%.
Considering that butterflies love "sweets", the museum has set up a number of brackets, plates on the top, and built-in sweet oranges, bananas and other fruit slices or honey, to supplement the luxurious buffet for butterflies to obtain nectar naturally.
But even then, there will still be some picky "customers" who will ignore them, and they will only have a special love for individual varieties of plants. For example, the Leopard Butterfly prefers plants such as purple-flowered ditin and pansy, which are called host plants.
Column editor-in-chief: Chen Xisha Title image Source: Chen Xisha Photo
Source: Author: Chen Xisha