Butterflies in our complex

[This post was updated with new sightings till December 2021. A total of 38 species were identified.]

All of us have surely encountered butterflies at some point in time (apart from the butterflies in our stomachs!). We learn about them in primary school. Sometimes they fly into us and make us jump. Often we see them just flutter by, so quick that we can’t even give them a second glance.

Ever since lockdown, we haven’t really been anywhere in Mumbai. No restaurants, no malls, no parks – except for the park in our Whispering Palms Complex, that is usually quite empty. Over the last few months during our daily walks, we looked forward to seeing the different birds in our backyard. More recently though, we noticed the many different butterflies – not surprising, given the sprawling gardens with abundance of trees and flowers, some wild and some nurtured.

Great Eggfly butterfly — Great Eggfly male sucking out nectar

With their beautiful wings in a variety of designs and colours, butterflies are in a way like birds. In Marathi in fact, butterflies are called “flowerbirds”.

पाखरू ⇄ bird फुलपाखरू ⇄ butterfly

Blue Mormon butterfly — **Blue Mormon** – the biggest butterfly of Maharashtra is the “State Butterfly”. Its upper is a brilliant blue (a small glimpse visible in this picture).

We started taking pictures and identifying them with the help of books and the internet, and when we do this we refresh our school memory and also learn new things about them.

Butterflies belong to a large insect group called Lepidoptera (scaly wing), along with moths. They are classified into two big families – Skippers that have their antennae tips hooked, and Papilionoidea (True Butterflies) that have clubbed antennae tips. The open wings view (or upper) is usually quite different from the closed wings view (where we see the butterfly’s face and the under of the wings). Certain species are variable, meaning that the butterflies may not look exactly what you see in the books.

The hours just fly by, watching them as they move from one plant to another, haltingly rest, and come back to the same plant again. Butterfly adults live from a couple of weeks to a maximum of 8 months. They look aimless sometimes, but for them, it’s all about feeding and propagating the species in the limited time that they have.

In Mumbai’s hill station Matheran alone, over 140 species of butterfly have been found. In a BNHS Reserve field guide, they have featured over 60 species that are commonly seen in the their premises in Mumbai Suburbs where we are located.

Here are over 20 species [Edit: many more being added] that we have captured for the record, some on a basic Canon DSLR, some on mobile phone cameras. There are others that we have seen, that have eluded our fumbling fingers.

Edit: List of species, July 2021 to December 2021

Skippers

Small Branded Swift
Blank Swift
Indian Palm Bob
Common Redeye

Swallowtails

Lime
Common Rose
Common Mormon
Blue Mormon
Tailed Jay
Common Jay
Common Mime

Whites and Yellows

Common Grass Yellow
Common Emigrant
Mottled Emigrant
Common Wanderer
Great Orange Tip
Psyche
Cabbage White

Brush-footed

Blue Tiger
Plain Tiger
Tawny Coster
Common Baron
Common Bushbrown
Common/Dingy Evening Brown
Chocolate Pansy
Grey Pansy
Lemon Pansy
Common Palmfly
Tailed Palmfly
Great Eggfly
Blue Oak Leaf
Common Indian Crow
Common Castor
Commander

Blues

Gram Blue
Dark Grass Blue
Indian Red Pierrot
Monkey Puzzle

Skippers

Skippers are a bit challenging to positively identify, especially for the novice. They’re mostly different shades of brown with distinctive markings that require pictures from different angles. Now with them restless as ever, getting one shot itself is an achievement of sorts. With the help of members of Butterflies of India group on Facebook, we narrowed down on the possible species, hopefully not off the mark.

Small Branded Swift

Small Branded Swift or maybe Conjoined Swift butterfly — Small Branded Swift [other possibility is Conjoined Swift]

Blank Swift

Indian Palm Bob

Common Redeye

Swallowtails

Lime

Common Rose

Common Mormon mimicry

The Common Mormon female is known to mimic the Crimson Rose (Pachliopta hector) and the Common Rose (Pachliopta aristolochiae) so IDing it is a bit tricky.

Common Mormon

Common Mormon female (under) non-mimicking

Common Mormon male butterfly — Common Mormon male (under)

Blue Mormon

Tailed Jay

Common Jay

Common Mime

Whites and Yellows

Common Grass Yellow

Common Emigrant

Common Emigrant butterfly — Common Emigrant
*[Addendum 14th December 2021]*

Mottled Emigrant

Common Wanderer

Great Orange Tip

Psyche

Cabbage White

Brush-footed

Blue Tiger

Plain Tiger

Tawny Coster

Common Baron

Common/Dingy Bushbrown

Dingy Bushbrown butterfly — Common or Dingy Bushbrown (under)

Common Evening Brown

Chocolate Pansy

Grey Pansy

Lemon Pansy

Common Palmfly

Tailed Palmfly

Great Eggfly

Great Eggfly male butterfly — Great Eggfly male (upper)

Blue Oak Leaf

Common Indian Crow

Common Castor

Commander

Blues

Gram Blue

Dark Grass Blue

Indian Red Pierrot

Monkey Puzzle

The next time you are outdoors, keep an eye out for these fluttering beauties.

All pictures taken at Whispering Palms Complex, Lokhandwala Township, Kandivali East, in Jul-Sep, by one of us – son Gautam, husband Srivathsa, me.
Addendum pictures – taken post the blog posting date till December 2021