One of Santa Elena’s extra sites worth visiting.
The tour in this delightful establishment was one of the highlights of the trip. The young, enthusiastic guides and the couple of interns gave us lots of information about the insects and butterflies and the precariousness of their survival. It was great to see young people who are really committed to maintaining an ecological foundation for the natural wonders of Costa Rica! The migration patterns of life in Costa Rica are less influenced by the north/south divergence than by the distinct climates in the highlands -vs- lowlands. As we learned from several guides, the parks are wonderful but if the places in between don’t support wildlife, the migratory patterns will be broken and many species will be irrevocably lost.
Our first stop was in the room of insects. They are kept in terrariums but we were able to hold some of them, as you will see. In order of appearance: a tarantula, scorpions, a walking stick, leaf bugs (you would swear you were looking at a leaf!) an unusual mantis, what looks like thorns on a branch but is really a group of tree hopper insects seen on a later jungle walk, and my friends, the wolf spider and the Giant Blagerus Cockroach, Timothy!
But, oft course, the butterflies were the main attraction. The butterflies are kept in 4 separate climate controlled enclosures, specific to the butterflies housed there, where they are free to fly around, mate and lay their eggs. I was able to carry a blue morpho who was still drying its wings from the case where it had emerged that day into the house where it would live for the next days. Even in this controlled environment, it was terribly difficult to get a good picture of this beautiful butterfly with its wings open. I only post them here to show the exquisite color. In the open, I never saw them sit still so I was surprised by the very different beauty of their underwings. And you can see that pattern in their caterpillar as well.
A similar looking butterfly is the owl butterfly, also very large. Its caterpillar and chrysalis, which looks a lot like a dried leaf, are also cool.
Here is another interesting butterfly, pretty brown underwings but incredible florescent markings on the top. Also note the unusual red proboscis
There are so many beautiful butterflies – here is a selection from our visit. We saw several of these on various walks in the next days.
And here are a couple of interesting caterpillars.
